DeepSeek V3 on Apple M3 Pro (18GB Unified)
Apple M3 Pro (18GB Unified) cannot run DeepSeek V3 at any quantization level. The 18 GB of VRAM is insufficient.
Model Size
671B
Device VRAM
18 GB
Bandwidth
150 GB/s
Quantizations Tested
1
Performance by Quantization
Each row shows DeepSeek V3 performance at a different quality level on Apple M3 Pro (18GB Unified).
| Quantization | Speed | TTFT | Fits in VRAM | Rating | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q2_K | — | — | ✗ Offload | Not Viable | estimated |
Notes
Q2_K
671B MoE. Doesn't fit. Requires 128GB+ Apple Silicon.
About DeepSeek V3
DeepSeek V3 (671B) is a chat, coding, ai coding, reasoning, multi-purpose model. Massive MoE model rivaling GPT-4 class. Only ~37B parameters active per token despite 671B total. Requires multi-GPU or very large unified memory (128GB+ Apple Silicon at Q2/Q3). Not for casual home use — included for completeness and to show what the high end looks like.
View all DeepSeek V3 hardware options →About Apple M3 Pro (18GB Unified)
Apple M3 Pro (18GB Unified) has 18 GB at 150 GB/s. Available in MacBook Pro 14", MacBook Pro 16".
See all models Apple M3 Pro (18GB Unified) can run →Source: MLX performance estimates (2026-03-15)
Data last updated: 2026-03-15