DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026) on Apple M5 Ultra (256 GB)

Can the Apple M5 Ultra (256 GB) run DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026)?

Yes, it runs great

Runs great. At Q3_K_M it needs about 159 GB of 192 GB usable, with an estimated speed of 89.5 tok/s.

Best quant: Q3_K_M
Generation speed: 89.5 tok/s
Prompt processing: 1,798 tok/s
First token (1K prompt): 0.6 s
Largest safe context: 742K

Best app to run it on the Apple M5 Ultra (256 GB)

On macOS

LM Studio

Desktop app · runs on llama.cpp, MLX · use the MLX build

Runs the MLX build, typically 10–20% faster than GGUF for a model with 13B active parameters on Apple silicon.
Point-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.

Open DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026) in LM Studio

llama.cpp Usually the first to support new model architectures.
MLX LM Runs the MLX build, typically 10–20% faster than GGUF for a model with 13B active parameters on Apple silicon.

Want an agent? DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026) supports tool use, so you can pair a llama.cpp or MLX LM server with one of these. Apps that run on this computer come first.

Coding agents

Personal assistants

How we choose: the files published for this model, your operating system and GPU, whether it fits fully in memory, and published speed tests (MLX vs llama.cpp on Apple silicon, vLLM vs llama.cpp vs Ollama on NVIDIA). Details.

Download DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026)

Recommended for the Apple M5 Ultra (256 GB): Q3_K_M. Every other quantization has its own download link in the table below.

Quantized files · GGUF

Works in LM Studio, llama.cpp, Jan and Ollama. No sign-in needed.

Download the Q3_K_M files (opens in a new tab)

huggingface.co/unsloth/DeepSeek-V4-Flash-GGUF (opens in a new tab)

ollama run hf.co/unsloth/DeepSeek-V4-Flash-GGUF

Original weights · Hugging Face

Full-precision files from DeepSeek, for fine-tuning, vLLM, Transformers.

huggingface.co/deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4-Flash (opens in a new tab)

No sign-in needed.

Links checked 3 days ago against Hugging Face, Ollama and GitHub.

How it’s rated

Quality 77Great quality (A) · 77 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 89/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.: How capable the model itself is at Q3_K_M, from its editorial quality tier scaled by the quantization or precision. It’s the same on any hardware that runs this variant. Scale: A+ 85+ · A 70+ · B 55+ · C 40+ · D under 40.
Runs Runs great: How well it runs on the Apple M5 Ultra (256 GB): speed, capped by how well it fits in memory. Runs great: 30+ tokens/s (or near the image, video or decision speed target) · Runs well: 10+ tokens/s · Slow: 3+ tokens/s · Very slow: under 3 · Won’t run: doesn’t fit even with offload. A tight fit or RAM offload caps it at Runs well; heavy offload caps it at Slow.

Match score

To order lists, each result also gets a match score out of 100 from four parts. It favors the most capable model that still runs well.

Model qualityEditorial quality tier of the model, scaled by the quantization or precision used.	34.8 / 45
Memory fitFull marks when the model fits in the share of unified memory the GPU can use; fewer when it goes past that limit.	25.0 / 25
SpeedGeneration speed against a 40 tokens/s target for LLMs, or render time against a target for image and video.	15.0 / 15
Memory useRewards using the memory you have, so a bigger, better variant beats a tiny one that leaves most memory idle.	15.0 / 15
Match score	89.8 / 100

The match score orders results; it is not shown as a grade. Quality and Runs are the two ratings in the tables.

Every quantization on the Apple M5 Ultra (256 GB)

Quant	Memory needed	Available	Speed	Runs	Quality	Download
`Q2_K`	133 GB	192 GB	107 tok/s	Runs great	64Good quality (B) · 64 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 83/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (UD-Q2_K_XL) · folder (opens in a new tab)
`Q3_K_M`	159 GB	192 GB	89.5 tok/s	Runs great	77Great quality (A) · 77 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 89/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF · folder (opens in a new tab)
`Q4_K_M`	194 GB	192 GB	62.4 tok/s	Runs wellover GPU memory limit	87Excellent quality (A+) · 87 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 79/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (UD-Q4_K_XL) · folder (opens in a new tab)
`Q5_K_M`	223 GB	192 GB	53.4 tok/s	Slowfar over GPU memory limit	89Excellent quality (A+) · 89 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 74/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF files (opens in a new tab)
`Q6_K`	255 GB	192 GB	—	Won't run	91Excellent quality (A+) · 91 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 12/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF files (opens in a new tab)
`Q8_0`	325 GB	192 GB	—	Won't run	92Excellent quality (A+) · 92 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 12/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (UD-Q8_K_XL) · folder (opens in a new tab)
`F16`	598 GB	192 GB	—	Won't run	92Excellent quality (A+) · 92 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 12/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	Original weights (opens in a new tab)

Memory figures assume 8K of context. Longer conversations or documents grow the KV cache.

Other hardware that runs it

91Excellent quality (A+) · 91 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 95/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB) Q6_K · 39.6 tok/s · Runs great
77Great quality (A) · 77 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 89/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Apple M3 Ultra (256 GB) Q3_K_M · 67.3 tok/s · Runs great
64Good quality (B) · 64 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 82/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Apple M2 Ultra (192 GB) Q2_K · 80.1 tok/s · Runs well (tight fit)
91Excellent quality (A+) · 91 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 95/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Apple M5 Ultra (512 GB) Q6_K · 54.4 tok/s · Runs great
89Excellent quality (A+) · 89 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 95/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. AMD Instinct MI350X Q5_K_M · 187 tok/s · Runs great
91Excellent quality (A+) · 91 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 94/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. AMD Instinct MI325X Q6_K · 152 tok/s · Runs well (tight fit)

Quick answers

How much memory does DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026) need on the M5 Ultra 256GB?

At Q3_K_M it needs about 159 GB. The M5 Ultra 256GB has 192 GB usable.

How fast is DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026) on the M5 Ultra 256GB?

About 89.5 tok/s at Q3_K_M, an estimate from the hardware’s memory bandwidth and the size of the model.

Which quantization of DeepSeek V4 Flash (April 2026) should I use on the M5 Ultra 256GB?

Q3_K_M. Of the versions that fit, it is the one that runs best; when two run equally well, the check prefers the higher-rated one.

Estimates come from published hardware specs and our open formulas, not from running the model on your machine. Real speed varies with runtime, drivers and settings. Numbers marked “Measured” come from a linked benchmark.