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MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GB vs RTX 3080 10GB for Local LLMs

The RTX 3080 10GB has about 39% more memory bandwidth (760 vs 546 GB/s). Batch-1 decode tracks bandwidth closely, so a model that fits both cards should decode roughly 39% faster on the RTX 3080 10GB. The MacBook Pro M4 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 M4 Max 128GB but not the RTX 3080 10GB: DeepSeek-V4-Flash (158.1B). MSRP is $4,399 for the MacBook Pro M4 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 32 rows vs 6. Methodology.

Spec comparison

MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GBRTX 3080 10GB
VendorAppleNVIDIA
VRAM128 GB10 GB
Memory typeLPDDR5XGDDR6X
Memory bandwidth546 GB/s760 GB/s
TDP160 W320 W
MSRP (list)$4,399$699
BuySearch Amazon (affiliate)Search Amazon (affiliate)

MSRP is the launch list price, not live retail. Buy links are Amazon affiliate links — the price after you click is the live price.

Q4 / 8K head-to-head — top 15 of 38 shared models

ModelParams (B)MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GB tok/sMacBook Pro M4 Max 128GB fitsRTX 3080 10GB tok/sRTX 3080 10GB fitsWinner
Qwen3-0.6B0.8434.3 est.Yes604.5 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
gemma-3-1b-it1.0347.5 est.Yes483.6 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
Llama-3.2-1B-Instruct1.2289.5 est.Yes403.0 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
Qwen3-1.7B2.0173.7 est.Yes241.8 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
gpt-oss-20b21.596.5 est.Yes209.1 est.NoRTX 3080 10GB
Llama-3.2-3B-Instruct3.2108.6 est.Yes151.1 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
Qwen3-30B-A3B30.5115.8 est.Yes136.3 est.NoRTX 3080 10GB
Qwen3-Coder-30B-A3B-Instruct30.5115.8 est.Yes136.3 est.NoRTX 3080 10GB
Qwen3-30B-A3B-Instruct-250730.5115.8 est.Yes136.3 est.NoRTX 3080 10GB
GLM-4.7-Flash31.2115.8 est.Yes130.9 est.NoRTX 3080 10GB
Phi-4-mini-instruct3.891.4 est.Yes127.3 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
Phi-4-mini-reasoning3.891.4 est.Yes127.3 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
gemma-3-4b-it4.389.1 est.Yes124.0 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
Qwen3-4B-Instruct-25074.086.9 est.Yes120.9 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB
Qwen3-4B-Thinking-25074.086.9 est.Yes120.9 est.YesRTX 3080 10GB

est. = bandwidth-based estimate; measured = curated real benchmark that overrides the estimate. Fits = weights + KV(8K) + 1 GB overhead ≤ 95% of VRAM.

Fit coverage at Q4 / 8K

MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GBRTX 3080 10GB
Catalog models that fit47 of 6117 of 61
Largest exclusive fitDeepSeek-V4-Flash (158.1B)—

MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GB details → · RTX 3080 10GB details →