Files read on Hugging Face: 2026-10-24

Qwen-Image-2.1 GGUF files and Mac RAM

Base Qwen-Image-2.1 text-to-image and editing model with a 7B visual generation component and a Qwen3-VL text encoder. The Qwen Research License allows non-commercial use only.

Qwen · Updated 2026-10-24
Answer

No published Mac run with a GGUF build yet. The smallest complete GGUF download is 10.70 GB; a download that fits in memory does not prove the model runs.

Smallest Mac with a published run
none yetunknown below
Smallest complete download
10.70 GBQ4_K_M GGUF
Files read
2026-10-24Hugging Face

Qwen Research License Agreement. Commercial use: not allowed. Excluded territories: none listed. Commercial use needs a separate commercial license from Qwen.

This is base Qwen-Image-2.1, not Qwen-Image-2.1-Turbo.

Table 1

Which exact GGUF files make a complete build?

Only builds with every required component and an exact probed file size are shown.

Q4_K_M GGUF

gguf · Q4_K_M · 10.70 GB complete

Mac routes: stable-diffusion.cpp

Exact component files for Q4_K_M GGUF
FileComponentRequiredDownloadSource
qwen-image-2.1-Q4_K_M.ggufunsloth/Qwen-Image-2.1-GGUFQwen-Image-2.1 transformerditYes4.20 GBHugging FaceRead 2026-10-24
Qwen3-VL-8B-Instruct-UD-Q4_K_XL.ggufunsloth/Qwen3-VL-8B-Instruct-GGUFQwen3-VL text encodertext_encoderYes5.15 GBHugging FaceRead 2026-10-24
vae/diffusion_pytorch_model.safetensorsQwen/Qwen-Image-2.1VAEvaeYes1.35 GBHugging FaceRead 2026-10-24

Build sources: Qwen-Image-2.1 GGUF card · stable-diffusion.cpp Qwen Image 2.1 guide.

Q8_0 GGUF

gguf · Q8_0 · 14.14 GB complete

Mac routes: stable-diffusion.cpp

Exact component files for Q8_0 GGUF
FileComponentRequiredDownloadSource
qwen-image-2.1-Q8_0.ggufunsloth/Qwen-Image-2.1-GGUFQwen-Image-2.1 transformerditYes7.64 GBHugging FaceRead 2026-10-24
Qwen3-VL-8B-Instruct-UD-Q4_K_XL.ggufunsloth/Qwen3-VL-8B-Instruct-GGUFQwen3-VL text encodertext_encoderYes5.15 GBHugging FaceRead 2026-10-24
vae/diffusion_pytorch_model.safetensorsQwen/Qwen-Image-2.1VAEvaeYes1.35 GBHugging FaceRead 2026-10-24

Build sources: Qwen-Image-2.1 GGUF card · stable-diffusion.cpp Qwen Image 2.1 guide.

Table 2

Does it fit your Mac's RAM?

Published names the exact measured machine. est. is a memory calculation. unknown means the run verdict is not established, not that the model fails.

Run verdicts by Mac memory tier
Mac RAMComplete buildDownloadRun verdictBasis
8 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBDoes not fitest.
16 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown
24 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown
32 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown
48 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown
64 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown
96 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown
128 GBQ4_K_M GGUFQ4_K_M · stable-diffusion.cpp10.70 GBunknownunknown

How does it rank in blind votes?

#19 of 82 in text to image blind votes, from 11,441 votes.

Quality: blind human votes from qwen-image-2.1 (arena.ai), CC BY 4.0, snapshot 2026-10-07. Scores are for the Arena checkpoint, not your local quantized build.

Which Mac software routes are listed?

  • stable-diffusion.cpp

    Official

    Formats: gguf, safetensors. Memory policy: component stages stay resident.

    C/C++ runner with Metal on Mac and CUDA on NVIDIA. It reads GGUF and safetensors, and its docs keep a page per model family. Resident size is the sum of the weights, an upper bound.

    Sources: stable-diffusion.cpp README, backends

What does the official configuration say?

"The card text-to-image example uses 2048 x 2048 and 40 steps. It gives no minimum VRAM or Mac RAM figure."

Source: Qwen-Image-2.1 model card · Read 2026-10-24.

What known issues should you check?

Sources