Text model · GLM
GL GLM-4.5-Air: RAM and VRAM requirements
GLM-4.5-Air needs about 71.8 GB to run at Q4_K_M (the Q4_K_M GGUF file is ~68.45 GB to download; KV cache and overhead add the rest), or about 112.7 GB at Q8_0. The lightest hardware that runs it is Apple M4 Max (128GB).
GLM family · 106B params (Mixture-of-Experts: activates only 12B of 106B params per token, so generation is faster than the total size suggests) · released Jul 2025.
Shopping for hardware? See what runs GLM-4.5-Air →
Q4_K_M and Q8_0 are GGUF download (file) sizes. Memory @ Q4 includes the KV cache and overhead, so it runs larger than the file on disk.
Will it run on your device?
GLM-4.5-Air runs on 4 of 40 tracked devices at Q4_K_M.
Memory breakdown
How context length changes it
Longer context grows the KV cache, which for GLM-4.5-Air is sized by its 12B active params, not the full 106B. It needs ~71.8 GB at 4k and ~148.4 GB at 128k.
Quantization sizes
| Quantization | Size on disk |
|---|---|
| Q2_K | 44.4 GB est |
| Q3_K_M | 51.8 GB est |
| Q4_K_M (default) | 68.45 GB |
| Q5_K_M | 75.5 GB est |
| Q6_K | 86.9 GB est |
| Q8_0 | 109.39 GB |
| FP16 | 212 GB est |
Lower quant = smaller and faster, slightly lower quality. Q4_K_M is the common default.
Run it
llama-cli -hf bartowski/zai-org_GLM-4.5-Air-GGUF:Q4_K_M lms get bartowski/zai-org_GLM-4.5-Air-GGUF Which devices can run GLM-4.5-Air?
Apple Silicon Macs
- Apple M1 (8GB) No
- Apple M2 (16GB) No
- Apple M4 (16GB) No
- Apple M5 (16GB) No
- Apple M3 Pro (18GB) No
- Apple M4 (24GB) No
- Apple M4 Pro (24GB) No
- Apple M5 (32GB) No
- Apple M4 Pro (48GB) No
- Apple M5 Pro (48GB) No
- Apple M4 Max (64GB) No
- Apple M4 Max (128GB) Yes
- Apple M5 Max (128GB) Yes
- Apple M3 Ultra (256GB) Yes
RAM-only laptops
iPhone & iPad
Android
NVIDIA GPUs
Same job, different size
Pick by what fits your memory: step down to free up VRAM, or step up if you have headroom.
Similar models
Head-to-head
FAQ
How much VRAM or RAM does GLM-4.5-Air need?
At Q4_K_M, GLM-4.5-Air needs about 71.8 GB (weights ~68.45 GB + KV cache + overhead) at a 4k context. At Q8_0 budget ~112.7 GB.
What is the Q4_K_M GGUF file size of GLM-4.5-Air?
The Q4_K_M GGUF file is about 68.45 GB to download, and the Q8_0 GGUF is about 109.39 GB. That is the weights file on disk; to run it you also need room for the KV cache and overhead, so budget ~71.8 GB of memory at Q4_K_M.
Can GLM-4.5-Air run on a laptop?
GLM-4.5-Air is large; you need a high-memory Mac or multi-GPU setup at Q4_K_M.
Is GLM-4.5-Air cheaper to run because it is a MoE model?
It is faster, not lighter. GLM-4.5-Air activates only 12B of 106B params per token (so it runs quickly), but all experts must stay in memory, so it still needs memory for the full 106B.
Can I use GLM-4.5-Air commercially?
Yes. GLM-4.5-Air is licensed MIT, which permits commercial use.
Understand the numbers
Short guides to the ideas behind GLM-4.5-Air's memory and quant figures.
MoE: 128 routed experts + 1 shared expert, activates 9 per token. 106B total / 12B active per zai-org HF card and artificialanalysis.ai. Context 128K (max_position_embeddings=131072) per search results and llm-stats. MIT license, commercial use explicitly permitted per zai-org HF card. Released July 28 2025 per artificialanalysis.ai and llm-stats. Q4_K_M 73.50 GB and Q8_0 117.46 GB measured from bartowski GGUF file listing. fp16_gb not listed in bartowski repo (only goes to Q8_0 at 117.46 GB). No official ollama.com/library tag; community tag MichelRosselli/GLM-4.5-Air exists but is unofficial.
Sources
Last validated 2026-08-03. Memory figures are estimates. See methodology.