Running MiniMax M3 on Mac Studio Ultra
MiniMax M3 has 428 billion parameters. Mac Studio Ultra offers 512 GB of Apple unified memory. This page puts the two side by side.
How much memory does MiniMax M3 need?
Weights take the parameter count multiplied by the format size, plus a 15% runtime margin for activations and buffers. The attention cache sits on top: it grows with context length and with the number of concurrent requests, so it is sized case by case.
| Format | Weights in memory | On this machine | What the format costs |
|---|---|---|---|
| FP16 | 984 GB | does not fit | full precision, the quality reference |
| FP8 | 492 GB | tight | negligible loss on most tasks |
| NVFP4 | 246 GB | fits | Blackwell format, native FP4 compute |
| Q4 | 246 GB | fits | block quantisation, broadly supported |
MiniMax M3 activates 23 billion parameters per token out of 428 billion. Active parameters govern speed, not footprint: every expert stays resident in memory. Confusing the two under-sizes the machine by an order of magnitude.
What is left to serve requests?
MiniMax M3 fits comfortably on Mac Studio Ultra. In FP8, its weights take about 492 GB of the 512 GB available, leaving 19.8 GB for the attention cache and concurrency. The remaining margin decides how many concurrent requests and how much context the machine sustains. A margin below a quarter of memory forces a limit on context or on concurrency.
Mac Studio Ultra ranges from 39 to 59 k€, indicative and not contractual. The machine targets the TPE, PME segment.
Where else can MiniMax M3 run?
- MiniMax M3 on DGX Station
- MiniMax M3 on RTX PRO 6000 server
- MiniMax M3 on H200 SXM server
- MiniMax M3 on B200 SXM
- MiniMax M3 on B300 SXM
See the MiniMax M3 and Mac Studio Ultra fact sheets.
How much memory does MiniMax M3 need?
In FP8, weights take about 492 GB including the runtime margin. The attention cache sits on top and depends on context.
Does MiniMax M3 fit on Mac Studio Ultra?
MiniMax M3 fits comfortably on Mac Studio Ultra. In FP8, its weights take about 492 GB of the 512 GB available, leaving 19.8 GB for the attention cache and concurrency.
Method
Parameter counts and memory figures come from the site fact sheets. Memory footprints are calculated, not measured: a reading on real hardware may differ depending on the engine and the exact weight format. Prices are indicative and not contractual.