picksbycard
October 7, 2026No. 158
Home / Will it run? / Qwen3 8B / Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB
Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB · 16GB GDDR6

Can the Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB run Qwen3 8B?

Fits comfortably at Q4_K_M.

Qwen3 8B is 8.2B parameters. At Q4_K_M the weights are about 4.6 GiB; with the 1.5 GiB runtime reserve that is 6.1 GiB against the card's 16GB, leaving about 9.9 GiB for context.

All three quants

16GB card
QuantWeightsWith reserveVerdictHeadroom
Q4_K_Mthe everyday quant4.6 GiB6.1 GiBFits comfortably9.9 GiB
Q8_0near-lossless8.1 GiB9.6 GiBFits comfortably6.4 GiB
FP16full weights15.3 GiB16.8 GiBOnly with CPU offloadshort 0.8 GiB

Verdict rules: fits comfortably when weights plus reserve sit within 85% of VRAM; tight when they fit with little left for context; CPU offload when they exceed VRAM by up to 2x (runs, slowly, with layers in system RAM); no beyond that. The KV cache per token depends on the model's architecture and is not modelled here.

The numbers for this pairing

At Q4_K_M the weights take about 4.6 GiB; with the 1.5 GiB we set aside for the runtime that is 6.1 of the card's 16 GB, leaving about 9.9 GB for the context cache.

The highest-quality version that fits entirely in memory is Q8_0.

The cheapest card on our list that runs it comfortably at Q4 is the Arc B570 at about $260, against about $530 for this card.

At about $530, this card costs roughly $33 per GB of VRAM.

Running it at its full 160 W board power for 4 hours a day would use about 19 kWh a month, about $3.53 at the US average residential rate of 18.4 cents per kWh (2026-05); real use sits below that ceiling.

Prices are the lowest current listings our tracker saw on Oct 7, 2026, since averages include premium variants; launch prices are marked where we have no listing.

Good match. Get the card.

The Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB clears Qwen3 8B at Q4_K_M and at Q8_0. Live listings below; this page was rebuilt 2026-10-07.

Amazon links may earn us a commission. Prices move daily; the links open live listings.

About the model

Qwen3 8B by Alibaba Qwen: 32,768-token native context, text, released 2025 under the Apache-2.0. Model card → · Hosted pricing on PicksByModel →

The Silicon Note

One short read on the GPU market, most mornings. No spam, one-click out.