Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) on NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU

Can the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU run Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B)?

Yes, it runs well (offloads to RAM)

Runs well (offloads to RAM). At Q2_K it needs about 14.2 GB of 12.0 GB usable, with an estimated speed of 49.6 tok/s.

Best quant: Q2_K
Generation speed: 49.6 tok/s
Prompt processing: 2,047 tok/s
First token (1K prompt): 0.5 s
Largest safe context: —

Best app to run it on the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU

On Windows

LM Studio

Desktop app · runs on llama.cpp, MLX

Splits the model between GPU memory and system RAM, which this setup needs.
Point-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.

Open Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) in LM Studio

Ollama Splits the model between GPU memory and system RAM, which this setup needs.
llama.cpp Splits the model between GPU memory and system RAM, which this setup needs.

On Linux

LM Studio

Desktop app · runs on llama.cpp, MLX

Splits the model between GPU memory and system RAM, which this setup needs.
Point-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.

Open Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) in LM Studio

Ollama Splits the model between GPU memory and system RAM, which this setup needs.
llama.cpp Splits the model between GPU memory and system RAM, which this setup needs.

Want an agent? Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) 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 Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B)

Recommended for the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU: Q2_K. Every other quantization has its own download link in the table below.

Quickest · Ollama

One command downloads a ready-to-run version and starts a chat.

Get Ollama at ollama.com/download (opens in a new tab) · model page (opens in a new tab)

ollama run granite4:small-h

Quantized files · GGUF

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

Download the Q2_K file (opens in a new tab)

huggingface.co/ibm-granite/granite-4.0-h-small-GGUF (opens in a new tab)

ollama run hf.co/ibm-granite/granite-4.0-h-small-GGUF:Q2_K

Original weights · Hugging Face

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

huggingface.co/ibm-granite/granite-4.0-h-small (opens in a new tab)

No sign-in needed.

Official repo · GitHub

Reference code, inference scripts and docs from IBM. The weights themselves download from Hugging Face.

github.com/ibm-granite/granite-4.0-language-models (opens in a new tab)

IBM’s official Granite 4.0 repo.

git clone https://github.com/ibm-granite/granite-4.0-language-models

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

How it’s rated

Quality 43Fair quality (C) · 43 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 59/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.: How capable the model itself is at Q2_K, 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 welloffloads to RAM: How well it runs on the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU: 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.	19.5 / 45
Memory fitFull marks when everything sits in GPU memory; fewer when part spills to system RAM.	10.0 / 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	59.5 / 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 NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU

Quant	Memory needed	Available	Speed	Runs	Quality	Download
`Q2_K`	14.2 GB	12.0 GB	49.6 tok/s	Runs welloffloads to RAM	43Fair quality (C) · 43 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 59/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab)
`Q3_K_M`	17.1 GB	12.0 GB	27.4 tok/s	Slowheavy RAM offload	52Fair quality (C) · 52 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 54/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab)
`Q4_K_M`	21.0 GB	12.0 GB	16.8 tok/s	Slowheavy RAM offload	58Good quality (B) · 58 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 55/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab)
`Q5_K_M`	24.2 GB	12.0 GB	12.4 tok/s	Slowheavy RAM offload	60Good quality (B) · 60 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 54/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab)
`Q6_K`	27.7 GB	12.0 GB	9.6 tok/s	Slowheavy RAM offload	61Good quality (B) · 61 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 53/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab)
`Q8_0`	35.5 GB	12.0 GB	—	Won't run	62Good quality (B) · 62 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 8/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab)
`F16`	65.8 GB	12.0 GB	—	Won't run	62Good quality (B) · 62 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 8/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (opens in a new tab) 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

62Good quality (B) · 62 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 82/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell F16 · 45.8 tok/s · Runs great
61Good quality (B) · 61 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 82/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Apple M4 Max (64 GB) Q6_K · 38.3 tok/s · Runs great
60Good quality (B) · 60 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 82/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Q5_K_M · 118 tok/s · Runs great
58Good quality (B) · 58 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 80/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX Q4_K_M · 81.7 tok/s · Runs well (tight fit)
58Good quality (B) · 58 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 80/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Q4_K_M · 89.3 tok/s · Runs well (tight fit)
58Good quality (B) · 58 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 80/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Q4_K_M · 94.0 tok/s · Runs well (tight fit)

Quick answers

How much memory does Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) need on the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU 12GB?

At Q2_K it needs about 14.2 GB. The NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU 12GB has 12.0 GB usable.

How fast is Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) on the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU 12GB?

About 49.6 tok/s at Q2_K, an estimate from the hardware’s memory bandwidth and the size of the model.

Which quantization of Granite 4.0 H Small (32B-A9B) should I use on the NVIDIA RTX PRO 3000 Blackwell Generation Laptop GPU 12GB?

Q2_K. 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.