FreeLLMGPUs › NVIDIA
Best free AI models for the RTX 3060 12 GB
RTX 3060 12 GB: 12 GB of video memory, 360 GB/s. These are the free models it runs, ranked by Arena votes, with the speed you can expect.
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Bigger models with help from 64 GB of system RAM
Part of the model sits in system memory, which is much slower than video memory.
| Model | Arena score | Size | 4-bit file | Tokens/s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gemma 4 31B |
1443 | 31.3 B | 20 GB | 5.9 |
| Qwen3.8-27B alibaba |
1441 | 27.8 B | 18 GB | 8.4 |
| Gemma 4 26B A4B google · MoE, 4 B active |
1434 | 25.8 B | 17 GB | 49 |
| Qwen3.5-27B alibaba |
1409 | 27.8 B | 18 GB | 8.4 |
| gemma-3-27b-it |
1358 | 27.4 B | 18 GB | 8.0 |
Popular small models
Official small models with no Arena votes yet, ordered by downloads on Hugging Face (popularity, not quality).
| Model | Downloads/month | Size | 4-bit file | Tokens/s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen3-0.6B Qwen |
29.5M | 0.8 B | 1.7 GB | 165 |
| Qwen3-4B Qwen |
11.8M | 4 B | 3.6 GB | 72 |
| Qwen3-8B Qwen |
8.9M | 8.2 B | 6.2 GB | 43 |
| Qwen3-14B Qwen |
8.4M | 14.8 B | 10 GB | 27 |
| Qwen3.5-4B Qwen |
7.8M | 4.7 B | 4.0 GB | 83 |
| Qwen3.5-9B Qwen |
7.5M | 9.7 B | 7.1 GB | 44 |
Estimates at 4-bit (Q4_K_M) with an 8K context, calibrated on 44 real llama.cpp tests (typical error about ±10%). Tokens per second: about 10 is reading speed. As an Amazon Associate, FreeLLMArena earns from qualifying purchases; the links do not change the rankings.
Questions
What is the best free AI model for the RTX 3060 12 GB?
No voted model fits entirely in 12 GB at 4-bit. Small models without Arena votes do, and larger ones run with help from system RAM, more slowly.
How big a model can the RTX 3060 12 GB run?
About 16 billion parameters for a dense model at 4-bit with an 8K context, fully on the GPU. Mixture-of-experts models can be bigger, and with 64 GB of system RAM larger models still run, more slowly.
Is the RTX 3060 12 GB good for local LLMs?
It has 12 GB of memory and 360 GB/s of bandwidth. Memory decides which models fit; bandwidth decides how fast they write. With less than 16 GB it runs small models well; bigger ones need system RAM and get slow.
Similar cards
- RTX 5070 12 GB · 672 GB/s
- RTX 4070 / 4070 Super 12 GB · 504 GB/s
- Arc B580 12 GB · 456 GB/s
- RX 7700 XT 12 GB · 432 GB/s
- RTX 3080 10 GB 10 GB · 760 GB/s
- RTX 5080 16 GB · 960 GB/s