Muse Spark Open (816B-A42B) on Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB)

Can the Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB) run Muse Spark Open (816B-A42B)?

Yes, it runs well (tight fit)

Runs well (tight fit). At Q2_K it needs about 361 GB of 384 GB usable, with an estimated speed of 30.6 tok/s.

Best quant: Q2_K
Generation speed: 30.6 tok/s
Prompt processing: 419 tok/s
First token (1K prompt): 2.4 s
Largest safe context: 355K

Best app to run it on the Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB)

On macOS

LM Studio

Desktop app · runs on llama.cpp, MLX · use the MLX build

Runs the MLX build, typically up to 10% faster than GGUF for a model with 42B active parameters on Apple silicon.
Point-and-click: search, download and chat in one window.

Open Muse Spark Open (816B-A42B) in LM Studio

llama.cpp Usually the first to support new model architectures.
Ollama Runs the Hugging Face GGUF with ollama run hf.co/…

Want an agent? Muse Spark Open (816B-A42B) supports tool use, so you can pair a llama.cpp or MLX LM server with one of these. Apps that run on this computer come first.

Coding agents

Personal assistants

How we choose: the files published for this model, your operating system and GPU, whether it fits fully in memory, and published speed tests (MLX vs llama.cpp on Apple silicon, vLLM vs llama.cpp vs Ollama on NVIDIA). Details.

Download Muse Spark Open (816B-A42B)

Recommended for the Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB): Q2_K. Every other quantization has its own download link in the table below.

Ollama

Ollama offers this only as a cloud model (it runs on Ollama’s servers, not your machine). To run it locally, use the GGUF files below.

Quantized files · GGUF

Works in LM Studio, llama.cpp, Jan and Ollama. No sign-in needed.

Download the Q2_K (UD-Q2_K_XL) files (opens in a new tab)

huggingface.co/unsloth/Muse-Spark-Open-816B-A42B-GGUF (opens in a new tab)

ollama run hf.co/unsloth/Muse-Spark-Open-816B-A42B-GGUF

Original weights · Hugging Face

Full-precision files from Meta, for fine-tuning, vLLM, Transformers.

huggingface.co/meta-models/Muse-Spark-Open-816B-A42B (opens in a new tab)

Free Hugging Face account needed: request access on the model page, and Meta approves it (usually within minutes to a few hours).

Links checked 1 day ago against Hugging Face, Ollama and GitHub.

How it’s rated

Quality 67Good quality (B) · 67 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 82/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.: How capable the model itself is at Q2_K, from its editorial quality tier scaled by the quantization or precision. It’s the same on any hardware that runs this variant. Scale: A+ 85+ · A 70+ · B 55+ · C 40+ · D under 40.
Runs Runs welltight fit: How well it runs on the Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB): speed, capped by how well it fits in memory. Runs great: 30+ tokens/s (or near the image, video or decision speed target) · Runs well: 10+ tokens/s · Slow: 3+ tokens/s · Very slow: under 3 · Won’t run: doesn’t fit even with offload. A tight fit or RAM offload caps it at Runs well; heavy offload caps it at Slow.

Match score

To order lists, each result also gets a match score out of 100 from four parts. It favors the most capable model that still runs well.

Model qualityEditorial quality tier of the model, scaled by the quantization or precision used.	30.3 / 45
Memory fitFull marks when the model fits in the share of unified memory the GPU can use; fewer when it goes past that limit.	24.0 / 25
SpeedGeneration speed against a 40 tokens/s target for LLMs, or render time against a target for image and video.	13.1 / 15
Memory useRewards using the memory you have, so a bigger, better variant beats a tiny one that leaves most memory idle.	15.0 / 15
Match score	82.5 / 100

The match score orders results; it is not shown as a grade. Quality and Runs are the two ratings in the tables.

Every quantization on the Apple M3 Ultra (512 GB)

Quant	Memory needed	Available	Speed	Runs	Quality	Download
`Q2_K`	361 GB	384 GB	30.6 tok/s	Runs welltight fit	67Good quality (B) · 67 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 82/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (UD-Q2_K_XL) · folder (opens in a new tab)
`Q3_K_M`	435 GB	384 GB	20.8 tok/s	Slowfar over GPU memory limit	80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 66/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (UD-Q3_K_XL) · folder (opens in a new tab)
`Q4_K_M`	533 GB	384 GB	—	Won't run	91Excellent quality (A+) · 91 of 100: how capable the model is at Q4_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 12/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF (UD-Q4_K_XL) · folder (opens in a new tab)
`Q5_K_M`	616 GB	384 GB	—	Won't run	93Excellent quality (A+) · 93 of 100: how capable the model is at Q5_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 12/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF files (opens in a new tab)
`Q6_K`	706 GB	384 GB	—	Won't run	95Excellent quality (A+) · 95 of 100: how capable the model is at Q6_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 12/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF files (opens in a new tab)
`Q8_0`	903 GB	384 GB	—	Won't run	96Excellent quality (A+) · 96 of 100: how capable the model is at Q8_0, whatever it runs on. Match score 13/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	GGUF files (opens in a new tab)
`F16`	1,676 GB	384 GB	—	Won't run	96Excellent quality (A+) · 96 of 100: how capable the model is at F16, whatever it runs on. Match score 13/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking.	Original weights (opens in a new tab)

Memory figures assume 8K of context. Longer conversations or documents grow the KV cache.

Other hardware that runs it

67Good quality (B) · 67 of 100: how capable the model is at Q2_K, whatever it runs on. Match score 84/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Apple M5 Ultra (512 GB) Q2_K · 42.9 tok/s · Runs well (tight fit)
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 80/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. AMD EPYC 7002 / 7003 series NAS (512 GB) Q3_K_M · 4.2 tok/s · Slow (tight fit)
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 78/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Intel Xeon Silver (4100 to 4300 series) NAS (512 GB) Q3_K_M · 2.1 tok/s · Very slow (tight fit)
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 78/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Intel Xeon W-2100 series NAS (512 GB) Q3_K_M · 2.0 tok/s · Very slow (tight fit)
80Great quality (A) · 80 of 100: how capable the model is at Q3_K_M, whatever it runs on. Match score 78/100 (quality, fit, speed and memory use) sets the ranking. Intel Xeon D-2700 series NAS (512 GB) Q3_K_M · 1.6 tok/s · Very slow (tight fit)

Estimates come from published hardware specs and our open formulas, not from running the model on your machine. Real speed varies with runtime, drivers and settings. Numbers marked “Measured” come from a linked benchmark.