Can Gemma 4 E2B run on MacBook Air M3 24GB?

YES — Runs Great

B69Good

○Estimated from fit model

Gemma 4 E2B needs ~7.4 GB VRAM. MacBook Air M3 24GB has 17.3 GB. With Q4_K_M quantization, expect ~22 tok/s.

Runtime: OllamaCapacity: RoomyBandwidth: Very lowStack: BasicBottleneck: Memory bandwidth

Operating mode

Choose the run profile you care about

Interactive favors responsiveness, while light API and scale-out lean harder on serving readiness. The fit stays the same, but the recommendation lens changes.

Current mode

Balanced

Balanced for general local use. Keeps the ranking neutral across personal and serving workflows.

Capabilities:

Select quantization to explore

Q4_K_M (Medium quality) — 7.4 GB, 23.8 tok/s, Runs well

7.4 GB required17.3 GB available

43% VRAM used

Fit status

Runs well

Decode

23.8 tok/s

TTFT

8145 ms

Safe context

128K

Memory

7.4 GB / 17.3 GB

Memory breakdown

Weights3.1 GB

KV Cache0.5 GB

Runtime1.2 GB

Headroom2.6 GB

See how fast it feels

See how fast it feelsGemma 4 E2B on MacBook Air M3 24GB
1st promptCold start — includes initialization
>Write a Python function to sort a list
Here's a Python function that sorts a list using quicksort:

def quicksort(arr):
 if len(arr) <= 1:
 return arr
 pivot = arr[len(arr) // 2]
 left = [x for x in arr if x < pivot]
 middle = [x for x in arr if x == pivot]
 right = [x for x in arr if x > pivot]
 return quicksort(left) + middle + quicksort(right)

# Example usage
numbers = [3, 6, 8, 10, 1, 2, 1]
print(quicksort(numbers)) # [1, 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10]

The algorithm picks a pivot, partitions the list into smaller, equal, and larger elements, then recursively sorts each partition and concatenates the results.
2nd promptWarm — model ready, no init overhead
>Now add type hints and a docstring
def quicksort(arr: list[int]) -> list[int]:
 """Sort a list using the quicksort algorithm.

 Args:
 arr: List of integers to sort.

 Returns:
 A new sorted list.
 """
 if len(arr) <= 1:
 return arr
 pivot = arr[len(arr) // 2]
 left = [x for x in arr if x < pivot]
 middle = [x for x in arr if x == pivot]
 right = [x for x in arr if x > pivot]
 return quicksort(left) + middle + quicksort(right)

Added type hints for the input and return type, plus a Google-style docstring.
Estimated: 23.8 tok/s decode · 8.1s TTFT (warm) · 59 tok/s prefill

What limits this setup

This setup is broadly balanced for this model.

Shared-memory contention still exists

The OS, browser, and inference runtime all compete for the same physical memory pool, so real-world headroom is less forgiving than raw capacity suggests.

Best improvement path

Performance by workload

Workload	Grade	Fit	Decode	TTFT	Context
Chat	B	Runs well	21.9 tok/s	4831 ms	128K
Coding	B	Runs well	21.9 tok/s	8857 ms	128K
Agentic Coding	A	Runs well	21.9 tok/s	12883 ms	128K
Reasoning	B	Runs well	21.9 tok/s	10468 ms	128K
RAG	A	Runs well	23.8 tok/s	14808 ms	128K