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Can the NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB run Gemma 3 1B?

RTX 3060 12GB × Gemma 3 1B8K context
YesRuns fully on the GPU
Memory at FP162.6 GB of 12 GB
Weights 2 GBKV cache 0 GBRuntime 0.6 GB
QuantFP16Full quality
Speed~108tokens per second
Max context32Kthe model's full window
  1. FP16
  2. Q8_0
  3. Q6_K
  4. Q5_K_M
  5. Q4_K_M
  6. Q3_K_M
  7. Q2_K

Yes. The NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB can run Gemma 3 1B fully in VRAM at FP16 (full quality), using about 2.6 GB of the 12 GB available, at roughly 108 tokens/second.

Try other context lengths

Run it with Ollama

With Ollama installed, one command downloads and starts Gemma 3 1B:

ollama run gemma3:1b

Ollama's default download is Q4_K_M (about 1.3 GB here). You have room for FP16, which is full quality: pick that GGUF in LM Studio or from Hugging Face.

New to this? Step-by-step setup for the RTX 3060 12GB

Run it in the cloud

No NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB? Run Gemma 3 1B in the cloud.

Rent a cloud GPU by the hour. No upfront cost, stop any time.

Rent a GPU on RunPodRent a GPU on Vast.ai

Memory needed by quantization

At 8,192 tokens of context. The black line marks the 12 GB the NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB can use.

QuantQualityMemoryFits?Speed
FP16Full quality2.6 GBFits~108 tok/s
Q8_0Near-lossless1.7 GBFits~203 tok/s
Q6_KExcellent1.5 GBFits~263 tok/s
Q5_K_MVery good1.4 GBFits~304 tok/s
Q4_K_MGood, most popular1.3 GBFits~356 tok/s
Q3_K_MNoticeably degraded1.1 GBFits~442 tok/s
Q2_KHeavily degraded1 GBFits~576 tok/s

Measured speed from real RTX 3060 12GB owners

Tokens per second that people measured on their own NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB, next to our estimate.

No one has measured Gemma 3 1B on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB yet. The speeds above are estimates. Run the benchmark and yours becomes the first real number on this page.

Have an RTX 3060 12GB? Add your real speed

One command times Gemma 3 1B in your own Ollama, shows you exactly what it would send, and asks before sending anything. No sign-up, no personal data.

macOS and Linux

curl -fsSL https://gpufit.dev/bench.sh | sh -s -- gemma3:1b

Windows (PowerShell)

$env:GPUFIT_MODEL="gemma3:1b"; irm https://gpufit.dev/bench.ps1 | iex

How the benchmark works

GPUs that run Gemma 3 1B comfortably

Models that run well on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB

Frequently asked questions

Can NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB run Gemma 3 1B?

Yes. The NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB can run Gemma 3 1B fully in VRAM at FP16 (full quality), using about 2.6 GB of the 12 GB available, at roughly 108 tokens/second.

How much VRAM does Gemma 3 1B need?

About 1.3 GB at Q4_K_M with 8,192 tokens of context, and about 2.6 GB at full FP16 precision.

How fast is Gemma 3 1B on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB?

Roughly 108 tokens per second at FP16, estimated from the NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB's 360 GB/s memory bandwidth.