Orca Mini 3B — Hardware Requirements & GPU Compatibility
ChatMath
Orca Mini 3B is a 3.4B-parameter open language model from pankajmathur in the Orca family. It supports a context window of up to 2,048 tokens. At Q4_K_M it needs about 2.26 GB of VRAM — see which GPUs and Macs can run it below.
1.1K downloads
166 likesSpecifications
- Publisher
- pankajmathur
- Family
- Orca
- Parameters
- 3.4B
- Architecture
- LlamaForCausalLM
- Context Length
- 2,048 tokens
- Vocabulary Size
- 32,000
- Release Date
- 2023-06-22
- License
- CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
Get Started
HuggingFace
How Much VRAM Does Orca Mini 3B Need?
Select a quantization to see compatible GPUs below.
| Quantization | Bits | VRAM | + Context | File Size | Quality |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q2_Kest. | 3.40 | 1.6 GB | — | 1.46 GB | 2-bit quantization with K-quant improvements |
| Q3_K_Mest. | 3.90 | 1.8 GB | — | 1.67 GB | 3-bit medium quantization |
| Q4_K_Mest. | 4.80 | 2.3 GB | — | 2.06 GB | 4-bit medium quantization — most popular sweet spot |
| Q5_K_Mest. | 5.70 | 2.7 GB | — | 2.44 GB | 5-bit medium quantization — good quality/size tradeoff |
| Q6_Kest. | 6.60 | 3.1 GB | — | 2.83 GB | 6-bit quantization, very good quality |
| Q8_0est. | 8.00 | 3.8 GB | — | 3.43 GB | 8-bit quantization, near-lossless |
| BF16est. | 16.00 | 7.5 GB | — | 6.85 GB | Brain floating point 16 — preferred for training |
est.= calculated VRAM estimate; no published GGUF file found for that quantization yet. Other rows are verified against real community uploads.
Which GPUs Can Run Orca Mini 3B?
Q4_K_M · 2.3 GBOrca Mini 3B (Q4_K_M) requires 2.3 GB of VRAM to load the model weights. For comfortable inference with headroom for KV cache and system overhead, 3+ GB is recommended. 50 GPUs can run it, including NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti.
Runs great
— Plenty of headroomWhich Devices Can Run Orca Mini 3B?
Q4_K_M · 2.3 GB59 devices with unified memory can run Orca Mini 3B, including NVIDIA DGX H100, NVIDIA DGX A100 640GB.
Runs great
— Plenty of headroomRelated Models
Frequently Asked Questions
- How much VRAM does Orca Mini 3B need?
Orca Mini 3B requires 2.3 GB of VRAM at Q4_K_M, or 7.5 GB at BF16.
VRAM = Weights + KV Cache + Overhead
Weights = 3.4B × 4.8 bits ÷ 8 = 2.1 GB
KV Cache + Overhead ≈ 0.2 GB (at 2K context + ~0.3 GB framework)
VRAM usage by quantization
Q4_K_M2.3 GB- What's the best quantization for Orca Mini 3B?
For Orca Mini 3B, Q4_K_M (2.3 GB) offers the best balance of quality and VRAM usage. Q5_K_M (2.7 GB) provides better quality if you have the VRAM. The smallest option is Q2_K at 1.6 GB.
VRAM requirement by quantization
Q2_K1.6 GBQ4_K_M ★2.3 GBQ5_K_M2.7 GBQ6_K3.1 GBQ8_03.8 GBBF167.5 GB★ Recommended — best balance of quality and VRAM usage.
- Can I run Orca Mini 3B on a Mac?
Orca Mini 3B requires at least 1.6 GB at Q2_K, which exceeds the unified memory of most consumer Macs. You would need a Mac Studio or Mac Pro with a high-memory configuration.
- Can I run Orca Mini 3B locally?
Yes — Orca Mini 3B can run locally on consumer hardware. At Q4_K_M quantization it needs 2.3 GB of VRAM. Popular tools include Ollama, LM Studio, and llama.cpp.
- How fast is Orca Mini 3B?
At Q4_K_M, Orca Mini 3B can reach ~1947 tok/s on AMD Instinct MI350X. On NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090: ~290 tok/s. Speed depends mainly on GPU memory bandwidth. Real-world results typically within ±20%.
tok/s = (bandwidth GB/s ÷ model GB) × efficiency
Example: NVIDIA B200 → 8000 ÷ 2.3 × 0.65 = ~2301 tok/s
Estimated speed at Q4_K_M (2.3 GB)
~2301 tok/s~290 tok/s~2301 tok/s~1947 tok/sReal-world results typically within ±20%. Speed depends on batch size, quantization kernel, and software stack.
- What's the download size of Orca Mini 3B?
At Q4_K_M, the download is about 2.06 GB. The full-precision BF16 version is 6.85 GB. The smallest option (Q2_K) is 1.46 GB.
- Which GPUs can run Orca Mini 3B?
50 consumer GPUs can run Orca Mini 3B at Q4_K_M (2.3 GB). Top options include AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT, AMD Radeon RX 6800, AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT. 50 GPUs have plenty of headroom for comfortable inference.
- Which devices can run Orca Mini 3B?
59 devices with unified memory can run Orca Mini 3B at Q4_K_M (2.3 GB), including AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 (Strix Point) Laptop, ASUS Ascent GX10, Apple iPhone 17 Pro, Asus ROG Flow Z13 (2025, Ryzen AI Max+ 395, 128 GB). Apple Silicon Macs use unified memory shared between CPU and GPU, making them well-suited for local LLM inference.