Can I run Qwen3 30B-A3B (2507) on the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB?
Runs slowlyQ4_K_M keeps attention on the GPU (2.9 GB) and its experts in 17.7 GB of system RAM: Runs slowly, est. 19.2 tok/s (13.4–24.9, theoretical estimate ±30%). Q2_K (heavy quality loss) would reach Runs great, est. 99.6 tok/s (79.7–119.5, calibrated estimate ±20%).
16 GB VRAM · 448.0 GB/s · FP16 23.7 TFLOPS. Assumes 32 GB of DDR5-5600 system RAM, Windows with this GPU driving the display, 8k context and an f16 KV cache.
Every quant of Qwen3 30B-A3B (2507) on the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB
| Quant | File size | Verdict | Speed | Memory | Runs as | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q2_K | 11.26 GB | Runs great | est. 99.6 tok/s79.7–119.5calibrated estimate ±20% | 13.2 / 16.0 GB | Full GPU | — |
| IQ4_XS | 16.38 GB | Runs well | est. 21.7 tok/s15.2–28.3theoretical estimate ±30% | 2.9 / 16.0 GB + 15.5 GB RAM | MoE experts in RAM | Not fully on the GPU — Runs great needs the whole model in GPU memory |
| Q4_K_Mbaseline | 18.56 GB | Runs slowly | est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 2.9 / 16.0 GB + 17.7 GB RAM | MoE experts in RAM | Experts run from system RAM — Runs well needs 20 tok/s or more on this path |
| Q8_0 | 32.48 GB | Won't run | — | Needs about 33.9 GB; 15.4 GB of VRAM and 28.0 GB of RAM are free | — | — |
Where the memory goes at Q4_K_M
- Weights
- 0.9 GB
- KV cache
- 0.8 GB
- Compute buffer
- 0.6 GB
- OS reserve
- 0.6 GB
- Free
- 13.1 GB
- Weights in system RAM
- 17.7 GB
Context length vs. KV cache
| Context | KV f16 | KV q8_0 | KV q4_0 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4k | 19.5 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 19.3 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 19.2 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
| 8k | 19.9 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 19.6 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 19.4 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
| 16k | 20.8 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 20.1 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 19.7 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
| 32k | 22.6 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 21.1 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 20.3 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
| 64k | 26.1 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 23.1 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 21.5 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
| 128k | 33.1 GBdoes not fit | 27.2 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% | 23.9 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
| 256k | 47.2 GBdoes not fit | 35.2 GBdoes not fit | 28.8 GBRuns slowly est. 19.2 tok/s13.4–24.9theoretical estimate ±30% |
S = Runs great · A = Runs well · B = Runs slowly · F = Won't run
At Q4_K_M the verdict stays Runs slowly up to 64k context with an f16 KV cache, and up to 128k with q8_0.
Estimated speed
- Generation
- est. 19.2 tok/s (13.4–24.9, theoretical estimate ±30%)
- Prompt processing
- Prompt-processing estimates only apply when the whole model runs on the GPU.
Why this verdict: Experts run from system RAM — Runs well needs 20 tok/s or more on this path
Measured on this exact combination
No public measurement for this exact combination yet; the numbers above are estimates.
If this is not enough
A smaller model that runs well on the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB
Runs wellMistral Small 3.2 24B: Runs well, est. 14.8 tok/s (11.8–17.7, calibrated estimate ±20%)
A lower quant of Qwen3 30B-A3B (2507)
Runs wellIQ4_XS (16.38 GB): Runs well, est. 21.7 tok/s (15.2–28.3, theoretical estimate ±30%)
Keep only the experts in system RAM
--n-cpu-moe 48 puts the experts of every layer in RAM (this estimate); 13 is the smallest value that still fits, and fewer layers on the CPU means faster.
How to run it
Commands for the Q4_K_M file. Both tools download from Hugging Face on first run.
File: Qwen3-30B-A3B-Instruct-2507-Q4_K_M.gguf (18.56 GB) from unsloth/Qwen3-30B-A3B-Instruct-2507-GGUF.
llama-server -hf unsloth/Qwen3-30B-A3B-Instruct-2507-GGUF:Q4_K_M -c 8192 -ngl all --n-cpu-moe 48 -fa on- -ngl all loads every layer on the GPU.
- --n-cpu-moe 48 keeps the experts of all 48 layers in system RAM, which is what this estimate assumes.
- With 13 the model still fits; fewer layers on the CPU means faster generation.
- -fa on enables flash attention (needed for KV cache quantization).
- --cache-type-k q8_0 --cache-type-v q8_0 shrinks the KV cache to 0.43 GB at 8k context.
Ollama has no expert-offload flag, so this mode is llama.cpp only.
Related pages
Guide: How much VRAM do local LLMs need? 8–32 GB tiers (2026)
Other models on the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB
Qwen3 30B-A3B (2507) on other hardware
Frequently asked questions
Can I run Qwen3 30B-A3B (2507) on the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB?
Q4_K_M keeps attention on the GPU (2.9 GB) and its experts in 17.7 GB of system RAM: Runs slowly, est. 19.2 tok/s (13.4–24.9, theoretical estimate ±30%). Q2_K (heavy quality loss) would reach Runs great, est. 99.6 tok/s (79.7–119.5, calibrated estimate ±20%). Q4_K_M needs 19.9 GB at 8k context; this setup has 15.4 GB of usable memory and 28.0 GB of free system RAM.
How much context can Qwen3 30B-A3B (2507) use on the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB?
At Q4_K_M the verdict stays Runs slowly up to 64k context with an f16 KV cache (6.4 GB of KV) and up to 128k with a q8_0 KV cache (6.9 GB). The model supports up to 256k.
Which quant should I use, and how fast is it?
Q4_K_M (18.56 GB) is the recommended balance: Runs slowly, est. 19.2 tok/s (13.4–24.9, theoretical estimate ±30%). It is also the largest tracked file that gets this verdict.
Speeds are estimates from memory bandwidth, calibrated against public benchmarks, and each one comes with an error band and a confidence label. Real results vary with drivers, backend, context length and thermals.