Model reference · open weights

AI21-Jamba2

LLMs ai21labs Text gen 1 build Open weights 8k dl/mo

AI21-Jamba2 is an open-weight language model from ai21labs. AI21-Jamba2-3B (BF16) weighs 6.4 GB; the smallest configuration that runs it is RTX 3060 12 GB.

For self-hosting, compare this build's requirements below with the GPU you plan to rent.

  • AI21-Jamba2 is a 3.0B parameter text-generation model developed by ai21labs for on-device deployments.
  • It features a 256K token context window and utilizes an SSM-Transformer architecture to run efficiently on consumer devices like iPhones, Androids, Macs, and PCs.
  • The model is released under the Apache 2.0 license.

Summary of the ai21labs/AI21-Jamba2-3B model card, 2026-10-01

What it is

Released byai21labs
Released2026-01-06
Parameters3.0B
VRAM6.4 GB for the weights

What it runs on

Memory and cards for AI21-Jamba2-3B (BF16)

6.4 GBweights, file size
1 MBcache per 1K tokens
10 MBfixed state per request
606 MBruntime overhead, at least
262,144 tokenscontext max
CardRequests at onceContext maxMemory
8K each32K each
RTX 3060 12 GB249105all 256K11.6 GB
RTX 4060 Ti 16 GB454192all 256K15.4 GB
RTX 3090 24 GB886375all 256K23.4 GB
RTX 4090 24 GB883374all 256K23.4 GB
RTX 5090 32 GB1000+549all 256K31.0 GB
L40S 48 GB1000+846all 256K44.0 GB
A100 80 GB1000+1000+all 256K78.2 GB
H100 80 GB1000+1000+all 256K78.1 GB
RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell 96 GB1000+1000+all 256K93.8 GB
DGX Spark (GB10) 128 GB unified1000+1000+all 256K107 GB
H200 141 GB1000+1000+all 256K138 GB
B200 180 GB1000+1000+all 256K176 GB
Memory needed at each load
Requests at once8K tokens each32K tokens each
17.0 GB7.0 GB
57.1 GB7.2 GB
87.1 GB7.3 GB
167.3 GB7.7 GB
327.6 GB8.4 GB
648.2 GB9.8 GB

One card, with vLLM's small-card settings.

From the model card

What ai21labs says about AI21-Jamba2

Read the model card

Jamba2 3B is an ultra-compact open source model designed to bring enterprise-grade reliability to on-device deployments. At just 3B parameters, it runs efficiently on consumer devices—iPhones, Androids, Macs, and PCs—while maintaining the grounding and instruction-following capabilities required for production use.

Released under Apache 2.0 License with a 256K context window, Jamba2 3B enables developers to build reliable AI applications for edge environments. For more details, read the full release blog post.

Key Advantages

  • On-device deployment: Runs efficiently on iPhones, Androids, Macs, and PCs
  • Ultra-compact footprint: 3B parameters enabling edge deployments with minimal resources
  • Benchmark leadership: Excels on IFBench, IFEval, Collie, and FACTS
  • 256K context window: Processes long documents and knowledge bases
  • Apache 2.0 License: Fully open source for commercial use
  • SSM-Transformer architecture: Memory-efficient design for resource-constrained environments

Evaluation Results

Jamba2 3B achieves category-leading performance on instruction following and grounding benchmarks despite its compact size. The model delivers consistent, context-faithful outputs across diverse enterprise tasks including RAG workflows and technical document processing.

Training and Evaluation Details

Jamba2 models were developed using a comprehensive post-training pipeline starting from Jamba 1.5 pre-training. The models underwent mid-training on 500B carefully curated tokens with increased representation of math, code, high-quality web data, and long documents. A state passing phase optimized the Mamba layers for effective context length generalization. Training continued with cold start supervised fine-tuning to establish instruction-following and reasoning capabilities, followed by DPO optimization.

The final training stages involved multiple on-policy reinforcement learning phases, progressively moving from short-context verifiable rewards to longer context training with mixed verifiable and model-based rewards. Evaluation focused on two key enterprise reliability signals: instruction-following benchmarks measuring steerability, and grounding benchmarks testing context faithfulness. Human evaluators assessed performance on real-world enterprise tasks using blind, counterbalanced side-by-side comparisons, rating outputs on factuality, style, constraint-adherence, instruction-following, and helpfulness.

Quickstart

Run with vLLM

Best results require vLLM version 0.10.2 or higher.

vllm serve "ai21labs/AI21-Jamba2-3B" --mamba-ssm-cache-dtype float32 --enable-auto-tool-choice --tool-call-parser hermes --enable-prefix-caching

Run with Transformers

pip install transformers>= 4.54.0
pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
pip install causal-conv1d>=1.2.0
pip install mamba-ssm
import torch
from transformers import AutoModelForCausalLM, AutoTokenizer

model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained("ai21labs/AI21-Jamba2-3B",
                                      dtype=torch.bfloat16,
                		attn_implementation="flash_attention_2",
                                             device_map="auto")

tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained("ai21labs/AI21-Jamba-3B")

messages = [
    {"role": "system",
     "content": "You are an HR Policy Assistant.
                 Answer employee questions using only the provided policy documents.
                 If the answer isn't in the documents, say so clearly.
                 Be concise and cite the specific policy section when possible."
},
    {"role": "user",
     "content": "Context documents: {retrieved_chunks}.
                 Employee question: {user_question}.
                 Answer:"
},
]

prompts = tokenizer.apply_chat_template(messages, add_generation_prompt=True, tokenize=False)

outputs = model.generate(**tokenizer(prompts, return_tensors="pt").to(model.device), do_sample=True, temperature=0.6)

generated_text = tokenizer.decode(outputs[0], skip_special_tokens=True)
print(generated_text)

Quoted from the model card on Hugging Face. The full card is behind the Hugging Face link above.

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