MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB vs RTX 3080 10GB for Local LLMs
The RTX 3080 10GB has about 90% more memory bandwidth (760 vs 400 GB/s). Batch-1 decode tracks bandwidth closely, so a model that fits both cards should decode roughly 90% faster on the RTX 3080 10GB. The MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB fits more of the catalog at Q4/8K — 47 vs 17 of 61 models (128 vs 10 GB VRAM). Largest model that fits the MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB but not the RTX 3080 10GB: DeepSeek-V4-Flash (158.1B). MSRP is $4,199 for the MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB vs $699 for the RTX 3080 10GB. MSRP is a launch list price, not live retail — Amazon prices move; click through for the current price. In the Q4/8K head-to-head below (38 shared models), the RTX 3080 10GB posts the higher tok/s in 33 rows vs 5. Methodology.