Fastest published Mac-family result
MacBook Pro M5 Max 128GB 16-inch maps to 50.0 tok/s from the strongest published chip-family row for Gemma 4 26B-A4B.
Canonical Rankings
Best Macs for this model
Gemma 4 26B-A4B ranked across the Mac lineup at the best practical quantization, using the best available runtime evidence. Model picker is focused on current-market choices.
| Rank | Mac | Score | Quant | Tok/s | Runtime | Fits | Headroom | Context | Evidence | Price | Why it ranks here |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mac Studio M3 Ultra 256GB | 456 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 230.2 GB | 262k | Estimated | $7,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 230.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 2 | Mac Pro M2 Ultra 192GB | 392 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 166.2 GB | 262k | Estimated | $6,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 166.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 3 | MacBook Pro M5 Max 128GB 16-inch | 368 | 8bit | 50.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 50.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 102.2 GB | 262k | Estimated | $5,399 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 50.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 102.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 4 | Mac Studio M4 Max 128GB | 328 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 102.2 GB | 262k | Estimated | $4,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 102.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 5 | MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GB 16-inch | 328 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 102.2 GB | 262k | Estimated | $5,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 102.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 6 | Mac Studio M3 Ultra 96GB | 296 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 70.2 GB | 252k | Estimated | $3,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 70.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 7 | Mac Studio M4 Max 64GB | 264 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 38.2 GB | 133k | Estimated | $2,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 38.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 8 | MacBook Pro M4 Max 64GB 16-inch | 264 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 38.2 GB | 133k | Estimated | $4,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 38.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 9 | Mac Mini M4 Pro 48GB | 248 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 22.2 GB | 74k | Estimated | $1,599 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 22.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 10 | MacBook Pro M4 Pro 48GB 14-inch | 248 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 22.2 GB | 74k | Estimated | $2,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 22.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 11 | Mac Studio M4 Max 48GB | 248 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 22.2 GB | 74k | Estimated | $2,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 22.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 12 | MacBook Pro M4 Pro 48GB 16-inch | 248 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 22.2 GB | 74k | Estimated | $2,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 22.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 13 | MacBook Pro M4 Max 48GB 14-inch | 248 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 22.2 GB | 74k | Estimated | $3,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 22.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 14 | MacBook Pro M4 Max 48GB 16-inch | 248 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 22.2 GB | 74k | Estimated | $3,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 22.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 15 | Mac Studio M4 Max 36GB | 236 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 10.2 GB | 29k | Estimated | $1,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 10.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 16 | MacBook Pro M4 Max 36GB 14-inch | 236 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 10.2 GB | 29k | Estimated | $2,999 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 10.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 17 | MacBook Pro M4 Max 36GB 16-inch | 236 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 10.2 GB | 29k | Estimated | $3,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 10.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 18 | Mac Mini M4 32GB | 232 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 6.2 GB | 14k | Estimated | $799 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 6.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 19 | MacBook Air M4 32GB 13-inch | 232 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 6.2 GB | 14k | Estimated | $1,499 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 6.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 20 | MacBook Air M4 32GB 15-inch | 232 | 8bit | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 8bit · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 6.2 GB | 14k | Estimated | $1,699 | 8bit is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 6.2 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 21 | Mac Mini M4 16GB | 187 | Q3_K_L | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: Q3_K_L · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 3.0 GB | 11k | Estimated | $499 | Q3_K_L is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 3.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 22 | MacBook Air M4 16GB 13-inch | 187 | Q3_K_L | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: Q3_K_L · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 3.0 GB | 11k | Estimated | $1,099 | Q3_K_L is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 3.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 23 | MacBook Air M4 16GB 15-inch | 187 | Q3_K_L | 40.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: Q3_K_L · 40.0 tok/s · MLX · Estimated | MLX | Fits | 3.0 GB | 11k | Estimated | $1,299 | Q3_K_L is the current best practical quantization. 40.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 3.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 24 | Mac Mini M4 24GB | 176 | 6bit | 28.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 6bit · 28.0 tok/s · Ollama · Estimated | Ollama | Fits | 4.0 GB | 10k | Estimated | $599 | 6bit is the current best practical quantization. 28.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 4.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 25 | MacBook Air M4 24GB 13-inch | 176 | 6bit | 28.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 6bit · 28.0 tok/s · Ollama · Estimated | Ollama | Fits | 4.0 GB | 10k | Estimated | $1,299 | 6bit is the current best practical quantization. 28.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 4.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 26 | Mac Mini M4 Pro 24GB | 176 | 6bit | 28.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 6bit · 28.0 tok/s · Ollama · Estimated | Ollama | Fits | 4.0 GB | 10k | Estimated | $1,399 | 6bit is the current best practical quantization. 28.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 4.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 27 | MacBook Air M4 24GB 15-inch | 176 | 6bit | 28.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 6bit · 28.0 tok/s · Ollama · Estimated | Ollama | Fits | 4.0 GB | 10k | Estimated | $1,499 | 6bit is the current best practical quantization. 28.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 4.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 28 | MacBook Pro M4 Pro 24GB 14-inch | 176 | 6bit | 28.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 6bit · 28.0 tok/s · Ollama · Estimated | Ollama | Fits | 4.0 GB | 10k | Estimated | $1,999 | 6bit is the current best practical quantization. 28.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 4.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
| 29 | MacBook Pro M4 Pro 24GB 16-inch | 176 | 6bit | 28.0 tok/s Fastest evidence path: 6bit · 28.0 tok/s · Ollama · Estimated | Ollama | Fits | 4.0 GB | 10k | Estimated | $2,499 | 6bit is the current best practical quantization. 28.0 tok/s is estimated from nearby benchmark coverage. 4.0 GB headroom remains at this quantization. |
Gemma 4 26B-A4B Apple Silicon benchmark and best Macs
Start with the ranked Mac table above, then audit tokens per second, RAM fit, quantization, runtimes, and source links before trusting the model on your Mac.
Quantizations observed: Q4_K - Medium
4Benchmark rows
4Chip tiers covered
50.0Fastest avg tok/s (M5 Max (128 GB))
—Minimum RAM observed
Quick take
Fastest published result is 50.0 tok/s on M5 Max (128 GB) at Q4_K - Medium. Published runtimes include MLX, Ollama. Start with Rankings for the decision, then use the raw rows below to audit the evidence.
Based on 4 external benchmarks; no lab runs yet.
Published runtimes: MLX, Ollama.
Best Mac shortlist
These are ranked by the fastest published Gemma 4 26B-A4B result available for each Mac's chip family. Use them as the search answer, then open the machine page before buying.
Shortlist rank 2
MacBook Pro M4 Max 36GB 14-inch maps to 40.0 tok/s from the strongest published chip-family row for Gemma 4 26B-A4B.
Shortlist rank 3
MacBook Pro M4 Max 48GB 14-inch maps to 40.0 tok/s from the strongest published chip-family row for Gemma 4 26B-A4B.
Model search answers
How fast is Gemma 4 26B-A4B on Mac?
Gemma 4 26B-A4B currently has a fastest published Mac result of 50.0 tok/s on M5 Max (128 GB) at Q4_K - Medium. Check the raw rows on this page before comparing that number to a different runtime, quantization, or context length.
What is the best Mac for Gemma 4 26B-A4B?
MacBook Pro M5 Max 128GB 16-inch is the fastest published Mac-family answer for Gemma 4 26B-A4B on this page right now, at 50.0 tok/s from its chip family. Treat that as a published benchmark starting point, not a universal buying recommendation.
Does Gemma 4 26B-A4B fit on Apple Silicon?
Gemma 4 26B-A4B does not yet have a published minimum-RAM fit row on this page. Use Fit before assuming it will run cleanly on a specific Mac.
Catalog record
25.2BTotal params
3.8BActive params
262,144Context window
2026-04-02Release date
What this model is, and what Apple Silicon users are actually seeing
Official model cards tell you what the model is for and which software stacks it targets. Field reality below shows how much Apple Silicon evidence we have so far.
Official brief
Gemma is a family of open models built by Google DeepMind. Gemma 4 models are multimodal, handling text and image input (with audio supported on small models) and generating text output. This release includes open-weights models in both pre-trained and instruction-tuned variants.
Official source · Raw model card
agentscodingreasoningvisual-understanding
Runtime support mentioned
llama.cppTransformers
Official specs
- Architecture: Mixture of experts.
- Total parameters: 25.2B.
- Active parameters: 3.8B.
- Context: 256K tokens.
- Experts: 8 active / 128 total and 1 shared.
- Modalities: Text, Image.
Official takeaways
- Reasoning: All models in the family are designed as highly capable reasoners, with configurable thinking modes.
- Extended Multimodalities: Processes Text, Image with variable aspect ratio and resolution support (all models), Video, and Audio (featured natively on the E2B and E4B models).
- Diverse & Efficient Architectures: Offers Dense and Mixture-of-Experts (MoE) variants of different sizes for scalable deployment.
- Increased Context Window: The small models feature a 128K context window, while the medium models support 256K.
Official model cards describe intent, capabilities, and supported stacks. They do not prove Apple Silicon speed by themselves.
Field reality on Apple Silicon
Gemma 4 26B-A4B: 9 Apple Silicon field reports; best reported generation ~75.1 tok/s; best reported prompt processing ~1688 tok/s; reported RAM use ~14.2-16.1GB; seen on M5 PRO 64GB, MacBook Pro M4 PRO 24GB, MacBook Pro M5 PRO 64GB; via oMLX, llama.cpp.
4Benchmark rows
9Field reports
6Practitioner signals
Sparse BenchmarksEvidence status
What practitioners keep saying
- The oMLX context table reports gemma-4-26b-a4b-it 4bit on an M1 Max 24-core 64GB Mac at 1024 tokens context with 347.1 tok/s prompt processing, 48.3 tok/s generation, 2.950s TTFT, and peak memory at 14.3GB.
- The oMLX context table reports gemma-4-26b-a4b-it 4bit on an M1 Max 24-core 64GB Mac at 4096 tokens context with 378.1 tok/s prompt processing, 46.1 tok/s generation, 10.833s TTFT, and peak memory at 14.9GB.
- The page also includes separate batching results; keep batching separate from single-stream ranking claims until first-party methodology matches it.
Apple Silicon field sources
A same-day oMLX sweep shows Gemma 4 26B-A4B running comfortably on an M1 Max 64GB setup, adding older high-memory Max coverage for the efficient Gemma 4 lane.
A same-day oMLX sweep shows Gemma 4 26B-A4B staying fast on an M5 Pro 64GB setup, adding a clean middle step between constrained M5 laptops and M5 Max reproduction targets.
A same-day oMLX report puts Gemma 4 26B-A4B 4-bit on a 24GB M5 Mac, making it a current efficiency candidate for small unified-memory Apple Silicon systems.
Gemma 4 26B-A4B has an oMLX 4-bit M4 Pro 24GB report, making it a practical frontier candidate for laptops below the larger-memory pro tiers.
mac-llm-bench reports Gemma 4 26B-A4B fitting on a MacBook Air M5 32GB at interactive-but-modest GGUF speed, which keeps the model relevant while reinforcing runtime-specific caveats.
1 more Apple Silicon field source tracked in the research queue.
Runtime mentions in the field
llama.cppoMLX
Hardware mentioned in reports
24GB32GB64GBM1 MaxM4M4 ProMacMacBook
What would improve confidence
- Reproduce Field Performance Signal
- Upgrade To First Party Measurement
Current published coverage
Published chip coverage includes M5 Max (128 GB), M4 Max (48 GB), M5 Pro (24 GB), M4 Pro (24 GB). Fastest published row is 50.0 tok/s on M5 Max (128 GB) at Q4_K - Medium.
Related Gemma 4 models with published pages: Gemma 4 E4B · Gemma 4 31B · Gemma 4 E2B
Raw benchmark rows for Gemma 4 26B-A4B
Rows stay below the ranking because this page is answer-first. Use them to inspect exact chips, quantizations, runtimes, and sources.
| Chip | Quant | Avg tok/s | Runtime | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| M5 Max (128 GB) | Q4_K - Medium | 50.0 tok/s | MLX | ref |
| M4 Max (48 GB) | Q4_K - Medium | 40.0 tok/s | MLX | ref |
| M5 Pro (24 GB) | Q4_K - Medium | 35.0 tok/s | Ollama | ref |
| M4 Pro (24 GB) | Q4_K - Medium | 28.0 tok/s | Ollama | ref |
Chips with published results for Gemma 4 26B-A4B
Data
benchmarks.json — full dataset · models.json — model summaries · benchmarks.csv — CSV export