NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB

Hardware · NVIDIA

What AI models can the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB run?

VRAM
12.0 GB
Usable for models
12.0 GB
Memory bandwidth
360 GB/s
FP16 compute
12.7 TFLOPS
Released
2021
Launch price
$329
477 / 621 LLMs run Best: K2 Horizon 7B 54 / 61 Image models run Best: FLUX.2 [klein] 4B 14 / 43 Video models run Best: LTX-Video 2B 68 / 70 Decision models run Best: Jina Reranker v3.5

More about this hardware

MakerNVIDIA
TypeGraphics card
InterfacePCIe 4.0

Apps that run models well on the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB

Windows

  1. OllamaOne command with Ollama’s own build of this model.
  2. LM StudioPoint-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.
  3. llama.cppUsually the first to support new model architectures.
  4. JanPoint-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.

Linux

  1. OllamaOne command with Ollama’s own build of this model.
  2. LM StudioPoint-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.
  3. llama.cppUsually the first to support new model architectures.
  4. JanPoint-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.

For a typical model that fits in memory. Each model page picks the best app for that model on this hardware. All apps

Best LLMs for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB

Quality Model Quant Memory Speed Runs
77Great quality (A) · 77 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 89/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. K2 Horizon 7BInstitute of Foundation Models Q5_K_M 8.8 GB 40.6 tok/s Runs great
78Great quality (A) · 78 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 89/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Gemma 4 12BGoogle Q4_K_M 9.2 GB 36.9 tok/s Runs great
75Great quality (A) · 75 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 88/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. MiMo V2.6 Distill Qwen 9BXiaomi Q5_K_M 8.1 GB 38.8 tok/s Runs great
75Great quality (A) · 75 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 88/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. SenseNova Loop 9B PreviewSenseTime Q5_K_M 8.5 GB 37.8 tok/s Runs great
74Great quality (A) · 74 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 88/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Ornith 1.5 9BDeepReinforce Q5_K_M 8.3 GB 37.8 tok/s Runs great
73Great quality (A) · 73 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 87/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Qwen3.5 9BAlibaba Q5_K_M 8.3 GB 37.8 tok/s Runs great
72Great quality (A) · 72 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 87/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Ornith 1.0 9BDeepReinforce Q5_K_M 8.3 GB 37.8 tok/s Runs great
71Great quality (A) · 71 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 87/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. TMax 9BAi2 Q5_K_M 7.8 GB 40.8 tok/s Runs great
70Great quality (A) · 70 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 86/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Nemotron 3.5 Bolt E4BNVIDIA Q8_0 9.8 GB 50.0 tok/s Runs great
68Good quality (B) · 68 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 85/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Gemma 4 E4BGoogle Q8_0 9.8 GB 50.0 tok/s Runs great
67Good quality (B) · 67 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 85/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Mellum2.1 Thinking (12B-A2.5B)JetBrains Q5_K_M 9.9 GB 96.6 tok/s Runs great
67Good quality (B) · 67 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 85/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. UI-Mate 9BTencent Q5_K_M 8.1 GB 38.8 tok/s Runs great

Best Image models for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB

Quality Model Quant Memory Speed Runs
76Great quality (A) · 76 of 100: how capable the model is at FP8, whatever it runs on. Match score 89/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. FLUX.2 [klein] 4BBlack Forest Labs FP8 10.2 GB 3.7 s Runs great
78Great quality (A) · 78 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4 GGUF, whatever it runs on. Match score 88/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Z-Image TurboAlibaba (Tongyi) Q4 GGUF 10.1 GB 12 s Runs great
84Great quality (A) · 84 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4 GGUF, whatever it runs on. Match score 87/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. FLUX 3 Image KleinBlack Forest Labs Q4 GGUF 10.2 GB 28 s Runs well
79Great quality (A) · 79 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4 GGUF, whatever it runs on. Match score 85/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. ERNIE-Image TurboBaidu Q4 GGUF 11.3 GB 16 s Runs welltight fit
78Great quality (A) · 78 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4 GGUF, whatever it runs on. Match score 85/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. FLUX.2 [klein] 9BBlack Forest Labs Q4 GGUF 8.0 GB 9.2 s Runs greatencoder in RAM
58Good quality (B) · 58 of 100: how capable the model is at FP16, whatever it runs on. Match score 81/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. DreamShaper XL v2 TurboLykon FP16 8.9 GB 5.3 s Runs great

Best Video models for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB

Quality Model Quant Memory Speed Runs
49Fair quality (C) · 49 of 100: how capable the model is at FP8, whatever it runs on. Match score 75/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. LTX-Video 2BLightricks FP8 10.8 GB 1.5 min Runs welltight fit
44Fair quality (C) · 44 of 100: how capable the model is at FP8, whatever it runs on. Match score 71/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. CogVideoX 2BZhipu AI FP8 11.0 GB 3.7 min Runs welltight fit
53Fair quality (C) · 53 of 100: how capable the model is at FP8, whatever it runs on. Match score 66/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. CogVideoX 5BZhipu AI FP8 9.6 GB 11.5 min Runs wellencoder in RAM
53Fair quality (C) · 53 of 100: how capable the model is at FP8, whatever it runs on. Match score 66/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. CogVideoX 5B I2VZhipu AI FP8 10.2 GB 11.5 min Runs wellencoder in RAM
55Good quality (B) · 55 of 100: how capable the model is at FP16, whatever it runs on. Match score 66/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Wan 2.1 T2V 1.3BAlibaba FP16 8.4 GB 17.1 min Slowencoder in RAM

Best Decision models for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB

Quality Model Quant Memory Speed Runs
86Excellent quality (A+) · 86 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 93/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Jina Reranker v3.5Jina AI F16 2.6 GB 43 ms Runs great
84Great quality (A) · 84 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 92/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Jina Reranker v3Jina AI F16 2.6 GB 43 ms Runs great
82Great quality (A) · 82 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 91/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. mxbai-rerank-large v2Mixedbread Q8_0 2.9 GB 97 ms Runs great
82Great quality (A) · 82 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 91/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. d1 3BLiquid AI Q8_0 4.5 GB 105 ms Runs great
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 91/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. FRIDA-DecisionsSber AI F16 2.4 GB 33 ms Runs great
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 91/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. GLiNER2.5 DecideFastino F16 1.7 GB 21 ms Runs great
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 91/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Qwen3 Reranker 0.6BAlibaba F16 2.6 GB 43 ms Runs great
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 90/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. zerank-1 smallZeroEntropy Q8_0 3.3 GB 108 ms Runs great

Best LLMs by task on this hardware Open in Model Finder

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.

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