text model · Falcon · macOS
Can I run Falcon3 10B on Apple M2 (16GB)?
Yes. Falcon3 10B runs on Apple M2 (16GB) at Q4_K_M (~7.5 GB of ~10.5 GB usable).
Runs at Q4_K_M using ~7.5 GB of ~10.5 GB usable.
That figure is at a 4k context and moves about ±15% as context length changes. Apple M2 (16GB) leaves ~3 GB of headroom.
- Q4_K_M needed
- ~7.5 GB
- Usable on device
- ~10.5 GB
- Device memory
- 16 GB
- Best quant
- Q4_K_M
Which quant fits
Running cost · estimate
- Power draw
- ~50 W
- Electricity / 1M tokens
- ~$0.15
- Pays for itself after
- ~3,426M tok
At ~$0.15/kWh and the estimated ~14 tok/s, a million generated tokens costs about $0.15 in electricity. Versus a hosted API at ~$0.5 per million tokens, the ~$1,199 Apple M2 (16GB) pays for itself after roughly 3,426 million tokens, so local hardware is mostly a fixed cost, not a per-token one. TDP is the peak draw, so this is an upper bound. Assumptions.
Run it
Pick your tool. All 3 load the same Q4_K_M weights.
ollama run falcon3:10b llama-cli -hf bartowski/Falcon3-10B-Instruct-GGUF:Q4_K_M lms get bartowski/Falcon3-10B-Instruct-GGUF - Parameters
- 10B
- Q4_K_M size
- 5.86 GB
- Q8_0 size
- 10.2 GB
- Context
- 32k
- Ollama tag
- falcon3:10b
- Memory
- 16 GB unified
- Usable for weights
- ~10.5 GB
- Power draw
- ~50 W
- Best runtime
- Ollama (llama.cpp Metal backend) / MLX
You could also run
Run Falcon3 10B on other hardware
FAQ
Can Apple M2 (16GB) run Falcon3 10B?
Yes. Falcon3 10B runs on Apple M2 (16GB) at Q4_K_M (~7.5 GB of ~10.5 GB usable).
How much memory does Falcon3 10B need?
Apple M2 (16GB) has room to spare. At Q4_K_M the weights are ~5.86 GB; with KV cache and runtime overhead, budget ~7.5 GB at a 4k context.
What is the best tool to run Falcon3 10B on macOS?
LM Studio for a simple setup; mlx-lm for the most speed. vLLM is NOT a Mac tool, it is a CUDA/Linux serving engine. Unified memory is not a fixed VRAM slice; ~70% is usable for weights.
Embed this
A live badge for your model card or README, updated as the data is. [](https://localmodel.run/can-i-run/falcon3-10b/apple-m2-16gb) Sources
- apple.com/newsroom/2022/06
- apple.com/newsroom/2022/07
- developer.apple.com
- github.com/ml-explore
- github.com/raullenchai
- gorilla.cs.berkeley.edu
- huggingface.co/bartowski
- huggingface.co/tiiuae
- lmstudio.ai
- ollama.com/library/falcon3
- ollama.com/library/falcon3/tags
- stencel.io
- support.apple.com/en-us/103253
- support.apple.com/en-us/111869
Weights are measured from GGUF files; KV cache and overhead are computed, so totals can vary ~15% with context and runtime. Any tok/s is a bandwidth estimate. See methodology.