Qwen3 4B 2507
Tiny, quick, and fits in 8 GB. The pocket knife of this list.
What you need
A Mac with an Apple chip, or a Windows or Linux PC. LM Studio says 16 GB of RAM is a good start. Check their system needs.
Steps
- Go to lmstudio.ai. Download the app for your computer and install it.
- Open LM Studio. Click the Discover tab. It looks like a search page.
- Type a model name, like one from our list. Pick the version from the maker or from
lmstudio-community. - Choose a file that ends in
Q4_K_M. Check that the size fits your memory. - Click Download and wait. Big files can take a while.
- Open the Chat tab. Pick the model at the top. Type a question.
Good first models
Gemma 4 12B
Google's open model with an Apache license. Fits a 16 GB machine.
GPT-OSS 20B
OpenAI, but you get to keep it at home. Plan on about 17 GB of memory.
Tips
- Close big apps to free memory.
- If it is very slow, try a smaller model.
- Your chats stay on your computer when you run a model locally.
Common questions
Is LM Studio free?
LM Studio is free to download from lmstudio.ai. Check their site for current terms.
Which file should I pick in LM Studio?
Most people should pick a file that ends in Q4_K_M. It is a good mix of size and quality.