🦬 Zubr Mini 1.9 3B — MLX
Repository: alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx
📖 What This Model Is
zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx is the MLX version of the model alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b, adapted to run on Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3/M4) via Apple's MLX framework.
The base model, zubr-mini-1.9-3b, is a 3-billion-parameter language model fine-tuned from Mistral 3 3B (Ministral-3-3B / Ministral-3-3B-Instruct-2512 by Mistral AI).
Key Features
- Multimodal (Vision): the model supports image recognition and Image-Text-to-Text tasks (image + text → text).
- Multilingual: language support expanded from 26 to 48 languages (including Russian).
- Performance: improved vocabulary, high inference speed, and deep instruction tuning.
- Lightweight: only 3B parameters — the model runs fast locally even on entry-level Macs.
- License: Apache 2.0 — free to use, including for commercial purposes.
Model Tree
mistralai/Ministral-3-3B-Base-2512
│ (quantization / instruct version)
mistralai/Ministral-3-3B-Instruct-2512
│ (fine-tune by alekringtonnn-ai)
alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b ← GGUF version (Ollama, llama.cpp, vLLM)
│ (conversion to MLX)
alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx ← MLX version (Apple Silicon) — THIS repository
📊 Versions (Quantizations) in the Repository
The MLX repository contains two weight files in .safetensors format with different quantization bit depths:
| Version | File | Size | What it is | What it's for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q4 (recommended) | zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q4.safetensors | ~4.26 GB | 4-bit quantization — a balance between quality and size | The default choice for most users: near-full model quality at reasonable memory usage. Suitable for Macs with 16 GB of RAM or more |
| Q2 (maximum savings) | zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q2.safetensors | ~3.17 GB | 2-bit quantization — the most compact option | For Macs with severely limited memory (8 GB) or when maximum speed/savings are needed. Response quality is noticeably lower than Q4 — hallucinations and errors are possible |
💡 How to choose: if in doubt, go with Q4. Q2 is a compromise for weaker hardware.
📥 How to Download
Requirements
- Mac with Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3/M4) — MLX does not work on Intel Macs, Windows, or Linux with other vendors' GPUs.
- macOS 13.5+ (14+ recommended).
- Python 3.9+ (3.10+ recommended).
- Free disk space: ~4.3 GB for Q4 or ~3.2 GB for Q2.
Method 1: huggingface-cli (recommended)
# Install the CLI
pip install -U "huggingface_hub[cli]"
# Download the entire repository (both quants + README)
huggingface-cli download alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx
# Or only a specific version:
huggingface-cli download alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx \
zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q4.safetensors
huggingface-cli download alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx \
zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q2.safetensors
By default, files are saved to ~/.cache/huggingface/hub/. The download path is printed to the console when finished.
Method 2: Direct links (browser / wget / curl)
# Q4 (recommended version)
curl -L -o zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q4.safetensors \
"https://huggingface.co/alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx/resolve/main/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q4.safetensors"
# Q2 (compact version)
curl -L -o zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q2.safetensors \
"https://huggingface.co/alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx/resolve/main/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx-q2.safetensors"
The same links also work in a browser: open the file page and click "Download", or append ?download=true to the URL.
Method 3: LM Studio (no command line)
- Install LM Studio on your Mac.
- In the search tab, type
zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx. - Select the quantization you need (q4 or q2) and click Download.
- The model will appear in your local models list — you can start chatting right away.
🚀 How to Run
Via mlx-lm (the official MLX library)
# Install
pip install -U mlx-lm
# Start chatting with the model (weights download automatically)
mlx_lm.generate \
--model alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx \
--prompt "Hello! Tell me about yourself."
Via Python
from mlx_lm import load, generate
model, tokenizer = load("alekringtonnn-ai/zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlx")
response = generate(
model,
tokenizer,
prompt="Hello! Write a short poem about a bison.",
max_tokens=512,
verbose=True,
)
print(response)
Via LM Studio
- Open LM Studio → the chat tab.
- Select the downloaded
zubr-mini-1.9-3b-mlxmodel from the dropdown list. - Set generation parameters (temperature, max tokens) and start chatting.
⚙️ Recommended Generation Parameters
| Parameter | Value | Comment |
|---|---|---|
temperature |
0.7 | A balance between creativity and accuracy |
max_tokens |
512–2048 | Depends on the task |
top_p |
0.9 | A standard value for instruct models |