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text model · Mistral · Windows

Can I run Ministral 3 8B on Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB)?

Compatibility verdict VRAM threshold engine
Yes, but tight GPU accelerated ~60 tok/s est.

Yes. Ministral 3 8B runs on Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB) at Q4_K_M (~6.3 GB of ~7 GB usable).

Needs ~6.3 GB Device usable ~7 GB

Fits at Q4_K_M (~6.3 GB of ~7 GB usable) but with little headroom. Close other apps; a smaller context frees a few hundred MB.

That figure is at a 4k context and moves about ±15% as context length changes. Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB) leaves ~0.7 GB of headroom.

Q4_K_M needed
~6.3 GB
Usable on device
~7 GB
Device memory
8 GB
Best quant
Q4_K_M
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Which quant fits

Quant ladder vs ~7 GB usable
Q2_K
~4.9 GB
Q3_K_M
~5.4 GB
Q4_K_M
~6.3 GB
Q5_K_M
~7.2 GB
Q6_K
~8.1 GB
Q8_0
~9.9 GB
FP16
~19.4 GB
The line marks Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB)'s ~7 GB budget; rungs past it are too large.

Running cost · estimate

Power & economics est.
Power draw
~200 W
Electricity / 1M tokens
~$0.14
Pays for itself after
~1,108M tok

At ~$0.15/kWh and the estimated ~60 tok/s, a million generated tokens costs about $0.14 in electricity. Versus a hosted API at ~$0.5 per million tokens, the ~$399 Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB) pays for itself after roughly 1,108 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

Install commands Windows

Pick your tool. All 3 load the same Q4_K_M weights.

Ollama
$ ollama run ministral-3:8b
llama.cpp
$ llama-cli -hf mistralai/Ministral-3-8B-Instruct-2512-GGUF:Q4_K_M
LM Studio
$ lms get mistralai/Ministral-3-8B-Instruct-2512-GGUF
Model Mistral
Parameters
8B
Q4_K_M size
4.84 GB
Q8_0 size
8.41 GB
Context
256k
Ollama tag
ministral-3:8b
Full Ministral 3 8B requirements →
Device Windows
Memory
8 GB vram
Usable for weights
~7 GB
Power draw
~200 W
Best runtime
Ollama (CUDA) / llama.cpp CUDA
Best models for Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB) →

You could also run

Run Ministral 3 8B on other hardware

FAQ

Can Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB) run Ministral 3 8B?

Yes. Ministral 3 8B runs on Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB) at Q4_K_M (~6.3 GB of ~7 GB usable).

How much memory does Ministral 3 8B need?

It is a tight fit on Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8GB). At Q4_K_M the weights are ~4.84 GB; with KV cache and runtime overhead, budget ~6.3 GB at a 4k context.

What is the best tool to run Ministral 3 8B on Windows?

LM Studio for a simple setup; Ollama (CUDA) for the most speed. AMD GPUs run via Vulkan/ROCm at roughly half CUDA throughput. NVIDIA is the smooth path on Windows.

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Sources

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.