How we got this number
Each generated token reads the whole model from memory once: 8.1 GB. The Mac mini M2 (16GB) moves 100 GB/s, so the ceiling is 12 tokens/sec. Real machines reach a fraction of that ceiling; we use 80%, calibrated against a measured Mac run. Send us your real numbers and we'll replace the estimate.
Faster machines for Gemma 3 12B
Other models on the Mac mini M2 (16GB)
| lfm 2.5 8B (A1B) | Fast | 65 tok/s |
| Gemma 2B | Fast | 47 tok/s |
| smollm 2 1.7B | Fast | 44 tok/s |
| starCoder 2 3B | Fast | 44 tok/s |
| falcon 3 1B | Fast | 44 tok/s |
| Qwen2.5 3B | Fast | 42 tok/s |