Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 on Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e (128GB) — VRAM, KV Cache & Throughput

Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 (235.09B total, 22B active, Sparse MoE + GQA) uses 132.39 GiB of 4-bit weights (Q4_K_M), requiring 134.42 GiB total at 8K context and 138.83 GiB at 32K on Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e (~47 tok/s decode).

Interactive Sizing Workbench

Full Compatibility Report →
128 GB · 3700 GB/s
Exceeds Available GPU Memory
Measured GGUF shard size HF config.json ↗
Memory Allocation Breakdown (GiB) 134.42 GiB (144.33 GB) / 128 GiB (105%)
Model Weights: 132.39 GiB KV Cache & State: 1.47 GiB Runtime & Activation Buffers: 0.56 GiB System RAM Offload: 0 GiB
Required GPU Memory
134.42 GiB
144.33 GB (decimal)
Usable Hardware Memory
121.6 GiB
128 GB (physical)
Safe Headroom
-12.82 GiB
105% utilization
Est. Decode Throughput
~47 tok/s
22B active params
Est. Prefill Throughput
~21686 tok/s
4K Prompt TTFT: ~189 ms
Est. Cost / 1M Tokens
$15.31
Sparse MoE + GQA · Apache-2.0

Recommended Hardware for Current Configuration

Best Single GPU
Instinct MI300X 192GB (192GB)
~$15,000
Best Value / Used GPU
2x A100 80GB SXM
160GB · ~$24,000
Apple Unified Memory
Mac Studio M4 Ultra 256GB
~$5,999
Cloud From
DigitalOcean · $2.59 / hr
1x Instinct MI300X 192GB

Production Launch Commands

llama.cpp (GGUF)
llama-server -hf unsloth/Qwen3-235B-A22B-Instruct-2507-GGUF:Q4_K_M \
  --ctx-size 8192 -ngl 999 --flash-attn
vLLM
vllm serve Qwen/Qwen3-235B-A22B-Instruct-2507 \
  --max-model-len 8192 --gpu-memory-utilization 0.92
Live Token Speed Simulator (TTFT ~189ms · ~47 tok/s)
[Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 · 134.42 GiB] allocated on target GPU. Prefill completed in TTFT window; streaming autoregressive tokens at memory-bandwidth-bound rate...

Cloud GPU Comparison & Rent-vs-Buy TCO

Verified public rates across RunPod, Vast.ai, Vultr, and DigitalOcean.

Verified: 2026-11-04
Purchase break-even
~21.1 months
Est. local power: $15.96 / mo
Provider Recommended Instance Total VRAM Hourly Rate Monthly at Selected Hours Billing Mode Deploy
RunPod 1x B200 180GB (Community Cloud) 180 GB $5.98 / hr $727.17 / mo Per-second Deploy GPU ↗
Vast.ai 1x B200 180GB (Verified Host) 180 GB $7.50 / hr $912.24 / mo Spot / On-demand Deploy GPU ↗
Vultr ($300 Free Credit*) 4x L40S 48GB (Dedicated Instance · $300 Credit*) 192 GB $6.68 / hr $812.77 / mo Hourly Deploy GPU ↗
Vultr Cloud GPU 4x L40S 48GB (Dedicated Instance) 192 GB $6.68 / hr $812.77 / mo Hourly Deploy GPU ↗
DigitalOcean 1x Instinct MI300X 192GB (Dedicated Instance) 192 GB $2.59 / hr $314.94 / mo Per-second Deploy GPU ↗

Rates reflect public listings on the verification date and fluctuate with regional inventory.

Fine-Tuning VRAM Requirements (QLoRA / LoRA / Full) — Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507

QLoRA (4b) Exceeds Available GPU Memory
136.55 GiB
Model Weights: 132.39 GiB · Gradients + Optimizer: 3.08 GiB · Act: 1.08 GiB
Recommended GPU: Instinct MI300X 192GB (192GB)
LoRA (16b) Exceeds Available GPU Memory
444.16 GiB
Model Weights: 437.89 GiB · Gradients + Optimizer: 4.84 GiB · Act: 1.43 GiB
Recommended GPU: 4x H200 141GB SXM (564GB)
Full BF16 Exceeds Available GPU Memory
1797.87 GiB
Model Weights: 437.89 GiB · Gradients + Optimizer: 1357.46 GiB · Act: 2.52 GiB
Recommended GPU: Multi-GPU Required

Engineering Sizing Notes & Optimization Playbook

Quick Hardware Verdict

A single Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e (128GB) cannot hold 4-bit Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 (134.42 GiB at 8K) entirely in VRAM. Use multi-GPU tensor parallelism, offload layers to system RAM, or deploy on a larger cloud GPU.

KV Cache & Runtime Tuning

Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 uses Sparse MoE + GQA (235.09B total, 22B active per token). Moving from 8K to 32K context expands FP16 KV cache from 1.47 GiB to 5.88 GiB; enabling 8-bit KV cache (llama.cpp -ctk q8_0 -ctv q8_0 or vLLM --kv-cache-dtype fp8) saves 2.94 GiB at 32K (reducing total VRAM to 135.89 GiB).

VRAM Scaling Across Context Windows (4K to 128K, 4-bit Weights)

Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 VRAM scaling from 4K to 128K context (4K: 133.68 GiB, 8K: 134.42 GiB, 32K: 138.83 GiB, 128K: 156.45 GiB) 4K 133.68 GiB (KV 0.73 GiB) 8K 134.42 GiB (KV 1.47 GiB) 32K 138.83 GiB (KV 5.88 GiB) 128K 156.45 GiB (KV 23.5 GiB) Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e (128GB)
Model weights remain constant while attention KV cache grows with context length and batch size.

Quantization Precision & Memory Matrix — Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 @ 8K

Quantization Format Weights (GiB) KV Cache Total VRAM (GiB) Decode Speed Compatibility (Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e) Recommended GPU Data Source
Native Weights (BF16 / FP8 / MXFP4 — Lossless) (BF16) 437.89 GiB 1.47 GiB 439.92 GiB (472.36 GB) ~1.7 tok/s Exceeds Available GPU Memory Multi-GPU Required Official checkpoint size
FP8 / GGUF Q8_0 (8-bit — Near-Lossless) (Q8_0) 232.77 GiB 1.47 GiB 234.8 GiB (252.11 GB) ~4.8 tok/s Exceeds Available GPU Memory Instinct MI325X 256GB (256GB) Measured GGUF shard size
GGUF Q6_K (6-bit — High Precision) (Q6_K) 179.76 GiB 1.47 GiB 181.79 GiB (195.2 GB) ~9.1 tok/s Exceeds Available GPU Memory Instinct MI325X 256GB (256GB) Measured GGUF shard size
GGUF Q5_K_M (5-bit — Balanced) (Q5_K_M) 155.36 GiB 1.47 GiB 157.39 GiB (169 GB) ~15.4 tok/s Exceeds Available GPU Memory Instinct MI300X 192GB (192GB) Measured GGUF shard size
Q4_K_M / UD-Q4_K_XL / AWQ (4-bit — Recommended) (Q4_K_M) 132.39 GiB 1.47 GiB 134.42 GiB (144.33 GB) ~47 tok/s Exceeds Available GPU Memory Instinct MI300X 192GB (192GB) Measured GGUF shard size
GGUF IQ4_XS (4.25-bit — Compact) (IQ4_XS) 116.86 GiB 1.47 GiB 118.89 GiB (127.66 GB) ~117.4 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Instinct MI300X 192GB (192GB) Measured GGUF shard size
GGUF Q3_K_M (3-bit — Low VRAM) (Q3_K_M) 104.72 GiB 1.47 GiB 106.75 GiB (114.62 GB) ~126.9 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Instinct MI300X 192GB (192GB) Measured GGUF shard size
GGUF UD-Q2_K_XL (2-bit — Extreme MoE) (UD-Q2_K_XL) 82.67 GiB 1.47 GiB 84.7 GiB (90.95 GB) ~148.6 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell (96GB) Measured GGUF shard size

Technical Specifications & FAQ

Does Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 fit on Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e (128GB)?

In 4-bit (Q4_K_M) at 8,192 context, Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 requires 134.42 GiB total GPU memory (132.39 GiB weights + 1.47 GiB KV cache + 0.56 GiB runtime buffers) against 121.6 GiB usable on Gaudi 3 128GB HBM2e, delivering ~47 tok/s decode.

How much VRAM does Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 need at 32K context?

At 32,768 context tokens, Qwen3 235B-A22B Instruct 2507 (Sparse MoE + GQA) allocates 5.88 GiB for KV cache and state, bringing total 4-bit VRAM to 138.83 GiB (149.07 GB decimal).

Evaluate This Model on Other GPUs

Evaluate Other Models on This Hardware