What LLMs Can the Tesla P40 24GB Run?
The Tesla P40 24GB has 24 GB of VRAM and 347 GB/s of bandwidth. It runs 41 of 58 models fully at Q4_K_M with 8K context, up to Qwen 3.5 35B-A3B, and generates about 35 tokens/s on an 8B model.
41 of 58 models fit
Tesla P40 24GB (24.0 GB) at Q4_K_M with 8K context. Largest that fits fully: Qwen 3.5 35B-A3B.
| Model | Needs | Status | Speed | Best quant that fits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen 2.5 32B | 21.4 GB | Fits | ~9.1 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| Qwen 2.5 Coder 32B | 21.4 GB | Fits | ~9.1 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 32B | 21.4 GB | Fits | ~9.1 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| Qwen 3 32B | 21.4 GB | Fits | ~9.1 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| Qwen 3.5 35B-A3B | 21.0 GB | Fits | ~70 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| Qwen 3.6 35B-A3B | 21.0 GB | Fits | ~70 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| Gemma 4 31B | 19.8 GB | Fits | ~9.6 tok/s | Q4_K_M |
| Qwen 3 30B-A3B | 18.8 GB | Fits | ~57 tok/s | Q5_K_M |
| Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B | 18.8 GB | Fits | ~57 tok/s | Q5_K_M |
| Gemma 3 27B | 17.6 GB | Fits | ~11 tok/s | Q5_K_M |
| Qwen 3.5 27B | 16.9 GB | Fits | ~11 tok/s | Q6_K |
| Qwen 3.6 27B | 16.9 GB | Fits | ~11 tok/s | Q6_K |
| Qwen 3.8 27B | 16.9 GB | Fits | ~11 tok/s | Q6_K |
| Mistral Small 3.1 24B | 15.6 GB | Fits | ~12 tok/s | Q6_K |
| Gemma 4 26B-A4B | 15.6 GB | Fits | ~60 tok/s | Q6_K |
| gpt-oss-20b | 12.9 GB | Fits | ~70 tok/s | MXFP4 (official) |
| Qwen 2.5 14B | 10.7 GB | Fits | ~19 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 14B | 10.7 GB | Fits | ~19 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| Phi-4 14B | 10.6 GB | Fits | ~19 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| Qwen 3 14B | 10.5 GB | Fits | ~20 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| Ministral 3 14B | 9.7 GB | Fits | ~21 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| Mistral Nemo 12B | 9.0 GB | Fits | ~23 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| Gemma 3 12B | 8.8 GB | Fits | ~24 tok/s | Q8_0 |
| Ministral 3 8B | 6.7 GB | Fits | ~33 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Qwen 3 8B | 6.6 GB | Fits | ~34 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Qwen 3.5 9B | 6.4 GB | Fits | ~34 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Llama 3.1 8B | 6.3 GB | Fits | ~35 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| DeepSeek R1 Distill Llama 8B | 6.3 GB | Fits | ~35 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Mistral 7B v0.3 | 5.7 GB | Fits | ~38 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Gemma 4 E4B | 5.7 GB | Fits | ~38 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Qwen 2.5 7B | 5.6 GB | Fits | ~39 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B | 5.6 GB | Fits | ~39 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Qwen 3 4B | 4.2 GB | Fits | ~61 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Phi-4 Mini | 4.1 GB | Fits | ~65 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Gemma 4 E2B | 4.0 GB | Fits | ~60 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Gemma 3 4B | 3.7 GB | Fits | ~66 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Qwen 3.5 4B | 3.7 GB | Fits | ~68 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Ministral 3 3B | 3.5 GB | Fits | ~74 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Llama 3.2 3B | 3.5 GB | Fits | ~77 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Llama 3.2 1B | 1.7 GB | Fits | ~208 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Gemma 3 1B | 1.6 GB | Fits | ~279 tok/s | FP16 / BF16 |
| Qwen 3.5 122B-A10B | 70.2 GB | 32% on GPU | ~8.5 tok/s | – |
| Mistral Small 4 119B | 68.2 GB | 33% on GPU | ~13 tok/s | – |
| gpt-oss-120b | 67.2 GB | 34% on GPU | ~16 tok/s | – |
| Llama 4 Scout | 64.0 GB | 35% on GPU | ~5.1 tok/s | – |
| GLM-4.5-Air | 62.1 GB | 36% on GPU | ~7.0 tok/s | – |
| Qwen3-Next 80B-A3B | 46.3 GB | 49% on GPU | ~29 tok/s | – |
| Qwen 2.5 72B | 44.5 GB | 51% on GPU | ~1.5 tok/s | – |
| Llama 3.3 70B | 43.2 GB | 52% on GPU | ~1.6 tok/s | – |
| DeepSeek R1 Distill Llama 70B | 43.2 GB | 52% on GPU | ~1.6 tok/s | – |
| Mixtral 8x7B | 28.0 GB | 81% on GPU | ~13 tok/s | Q2_K |
| Kimi K2.6 | 566 GB | Too small | – | – |
| DeepSeek R1 671B | 380 GB | Too small | – | – |
| Llama 3.1 405B | 234 GB | Too small | – | – |
| Qwen 3.5 397B-A17B | 226 GB | Too small | – | – |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | 161 GB | Too small | – | – |
| Qwen 3 235B-A22B | 135 GB | Too small | – | – |
| MiniMax-M2 | 133 GB | Too small | – | – |
Tesla P40 24GB for local AI
A cheap used datacenter card with 24 GB. It runs 32B models at Q4_K_M in llama.cpp, but it is slow, has no display output or fan, and lacks fast FP16, so it is poor for image generation and unsupported by many newer tools.
Among the 8 devices we track with about 24 GB of usable memory, the Tesla P40 24GB ranks 7 of 8 for text-generation speed, because generation speed follows memory bandwidth. Others in the same class: RTX 3090 Ti 24GB, RTX 4090 24GB, Radeon RX 7900 XTX 24GB, RTX 3090 24GB. They all hold the same models; the faster ones simply answer sooner.
Our picks for the Tesla P40 24GB
The model we would run first for each job, chosen from our recommendations by what fits fully with an 8K context. "Best quant" is the highest quality that fits; "max context" is at Q4_K_M or the native format.
| Task | Model | Best quant | Max context | Speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Best all-rounder | Qwen 3.6 27B | Q6_K | 98K | ~11 tok/s |
| Coding | Qwen 3.6 27B | Q6_K | 98K | ~11 tok/s |
| Fastest replies | Qwen 3.6 35B-A3B | Q4_K_M | 88K | ~70 tok/s |
| Long documents (64K+) | Qwen 3.8 27B | Q6_K | 98K | ~11 tok/s |
| Images in, text out | Gemma 4 31B | Q4_K_M | 43K | ~9.6 tok/s |
| Image generation | Qwen-Image | FP8 | – | – |
| Spec | Value |
|---|---|
| Memory | 24 GB |
| Memory bandwidth | 347 GB/s |
| Architecture | Pascal |
| Released | 2016-09 |
| Llama 3.1 8B Q4_K_M speed | ~35 tok/s |
| Largest model that fits | Qwen 3.5 35B-A3B |
Image and video models on the Tesla P40 24GB
Peak VRAM with model swapping (ComfyUI default on smaller cards).
| Model | FP8 | FP8 fit | GGUF Q4 | Q4 fit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stable Diffusion 1.5 | 1.8 GB | Fits | 1.7 GB | Fits |
| SDXL 1.0 | 4.1 GB | Fits | 4.1 GB | Fits |
| Stable Diffusion 3.5 Medium | 6.4 GB | Fits | 6.4 GB | Fits |
| Stable Diffusion 3.5 Large | 8.6 GB | Fits | 6.4 GB | Fits |
| FLUX.1 [dev] | 12.1 GB | Fits | 7.3 GB | Fits |
| FLUX.1 [schnell] | 12.1 GB | Fits | 7.3 GB | Fits |
| Qwen-Image | 20.4 GB | Fits | 12.3 GB | Fits |
| Wan 2.2 A14B (T2V / I2V) | 18.8 GB | Fits | 13.2 GB | Fits |
| Wan 2.2 TI2V 5B | 8.0 GB | Fits | 6.5 GB | Fits |
| HunyuanVideo | 18.3 GB | Fits | 13.1 GB | Fits |
| FLUX.1 Kontext [dev] | 12.3 GB | Fits | 7.5 GB | Fits |
| FLUX.2 [dev] | 31.0 GB | 73% on GPU | 23.6 GB | Tight fit |
| Z-Image Turbo | 6.8 GB | Fits | 4.9 GB | Fits |
| Qwen-Image-Edit 2509 | 20.5 GB | Fits | 12.4 GB | Fits |
| LTX-2 | 19.2 GB | Fits | 12.6 GB | Fits |
Upgrade path
The next step up is the A100 40GB with 40 GB and 348% more bandwidth.
Comparisons
Tesla P40 24GB for LLMs: common questions
Can the Tesla P40 24GB run Llama 3.3 70B?
Only partly. It needs about 43.2 GB at Q4_K_M, so about 52% fits in VRAM and the rest runs from system RAM, which is slow.
Can the Tesla P40 24GB run Qwen 3 32B?
Yes. Qwen 3 32B needs about 21.4 GB at Q4_K_M with 8K context, and the best quality that fits is Q4_K_M.
Can the Tesla P40 24GB run Qwen 3 14B?
Yes. Qwen 3 14B needs about 10.5 GB at Q4_K_M with 8K context, and the best quality that fits is Q8_0.
How fast is the Tesla P40 24GB for LLMs?
About 35 tokens per second for an 8B model at Q4_K_M, based on its 347 GB/s memory bandwidth. Larger models scale down roughly in proportion to their size.