# Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B-A3B: RAM and VRAM requirements

> Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B-A3B is a 30B Nemotron 3.5 model (Mixture-of-Experts, 3B active per token). At Q4_K_M it needs about **25.8 GB** to run and fits **9 of 43** tracked devices. Minimum to run: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 (32GB).

Last validated: 2026-09-07. Sources: Ollama, HuggingFace GGUF repos, vendor specs.

## Memory by quantization
| Quant | On disk | To run (4k context) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Q4_K_M | 23.73 GB | ~25.8 GB |
| Q8_0 | 34.63 GB | ~36.7 GB |
| FP16 | 65.85 GB | ~67.9 GB |

Memory = weights + KV cache + ~0.8 GB runtime overhead, and varies ±15% with context length.

## Will it run on my device?
- **Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 (6GB)** (6 GB): No, not enough memory
- **Generic Android Phone (8GB RAM)** (8 GB): No, not enough memory
- **Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra** (12 GB): No, not enough memory
- **Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 Ti (16GB)** (16 GB): No, not enough memory
- **Apple M5 (16GB)** (16 GB): No, not enough memory
- **Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 (24GB)** (24 GB): No, not enough memory
- **Apple M4 Pro (48GB)** (48 GB): Yes, it runs
- **Apple M3 Ultra (256GB)** (256 GB): Yes, it runs (room for FP16)

Full table of all 43 devices: https://localmodel.run/model/nemotron-3.5-lightning-30b-a3b

## How to run
Quickest path: `ollama run nemotron-3.5-lightning:30b-a3b`. On Mac, LM Studio (ships MLX) is fastest; on Linux, Ollama for chat or vLLM to serve; on Windows, LM Studio or Ollama.

## Details
- Parameters: 30B (MoE, 3B active per token)
- Default context: 1000k tokens
- License: OpenMDW-1.1 (commercial use: yes)
- Released: 2026-08
- HuggingFace: 474,966 downloads/mo, 202 likes

## FAQ
### How much VRAM or RAM does Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B-A3B need?
About 25.8 GB at Q4_K_M (weights 23.73 GB + KV cache + overhead) at a 4k context. Budget ~36.7 GB for Q8_0.
### Can Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B-A3B run on a laptop?
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B-A3B is large; you need a high-memory Mac or a 24 GB+ GPU at Q4_K_M.
### Can I use Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B-A3B commercially?
Yes, OpenMDW-1.1 permits commercial use.

Sources: https://huggingface.co/nvidia/NVIDIA-Nemotron-3.5-Lightning-30B-A3B-BF16, https://huggingface.co/bartowski/NVIDIA-Nemotron-3.5-Lightning-30B-A3B-GGUF, https://ollama.com/library/nemotron-3.5-lightning/tags
More: https://localmodel.run/model/nemotron-3.5-lightning-30b-a3b