Hardware comparison
MacBook Pro / Mac mini M4 Pro (24GB) vs MacBook Air/Pro M5 (32GB) for local LLMs
How the two stack up for running open-source LLMs locally — memory, bandwidth, price, and how many of the 69 tracked models each one can run.
Scroll sideways to compare both machines. Keyboard: focus the table, then use the arrow keys. Metric names stay visible.
| Hardware | MacBook Pro / Mac mini M4 Pro (24GB) | MacBook Air/Pro M5 (32GB) |
|---|---|---|
| Memory | 24.0 GB | 32.0 GB (better for this comparison) |
| Bandwidth | 273 GB/s (better for this comparison) | 153 GB/s |
| Price (approx) | $1,999Complete system | $1,499 (better for this comparison)Complete system |
| LLMs it runs | 49 of 69 | 51 of 69 (better for this comparison) |
| Best model it runs | Gemma 4 31BQ2_K · estimated 13–20 tok/s | Gemma 4 31BQ2_K · estimated 8–11 tok/s |
Both prices cover complete systems. Prices are approximate catalog estimates; check current configurations and prices before buying.
Both estimated speeds use the same model and quant shown above. Estimates use 4,096 context tokens, llama.cpp and one stream.
The MacBook Air/Pro M5 (32GB) runs 2 more of the tracked models (51 vs 49), thanks to its 32.0 GB of memory. The MacBook Pro / Mac mini M4 Pro (24GB) has more memory bandwidth (273 GB/s). Higher bandwidth can help generation speed, but model, quant, architecture and runtime also affect the estimates.