Apollo-VL-Edge-3B (MLX FP16)

Intelligence isn't about scale. It's about precision.


Overview

Apollo-VL-Edge-3B (MLX FP16) is the native Apple Silicon port of Apollo-VL-Edge-3B, engineered by Pluto AI Labs. This repository contains the MLX FP16 quantization, converted from the original FP16 Transformers checkpoint and optimized to run natively on Apple M-Series chips (M1/M2/M3/M4) using the unified memory architecture via the mlx-vlm framework.

This is the full-precision MLX variant — recommended for maximum reasoning quality on Apple Silicon when RAM permits.


Specifications

Property Value
Base Model Pluto-AI-Labs/Apollo-VL-Edge-3B
Architecture Qwen2.5-VL
Format MLX FP16
File Size ~7.5 GB
Recommended RAM 16 GB (M-Series Mac)
Target Hardware Apple M1/M2/M3/M4 (16GB+)
Precision Loss Baseline

Quick Start

Install the mlx-vlm framework and run inference locally:

```bash pip install mlx-vlm ```

```bash python -m mlx_vlm.generate
--model Pluto-AI-Labs/Apollo-VL-Edge-3B-MLX-FP16
--image ./your_image.png
--prompt "Analyze this image step-by-step."
--max-tokens 512 ```

Python API

```python from mlx_vlm import load, generate from mlx_vlm.prompt_utils import apply_chat_template from mlx_vlm.utils import load_config

model_path = "Pluto-AI-Labs/Apollo-VL-Edge-3B-MLX-FP16"

model, processor = load(model_path) config = load_config(model_path)

prompt = apply_chat_template( processor, config, "Analyze this image step-by-step.", num_images=1 )

output = generate( model, processor, "./your_image.png", prompt, max_tokens=512, verbose=True ) ```


MLX Quantization Family

All Apollo-VL MLX variants are available for different hardware targets:

Variant File Size Recommended RAM Precision Loss
MLX FP16 (This Repo) ~7.5 GB 16 GB Baseline
MLX 8bit ~4.3 GB 8 GB Minimal
MLX 6bit ~3.6 GB 8 GB Low
MLX 4bit ~2.9 GB 8 GB Moderate

💡 For the original FP16 Transformers checkpoint, GGUF quantizations, and full benchmark results, see the main model repository.


About Pluto AI Labs

Pluto AI Labs is an independent open-source AI research lab focused on efficient intelligence, multimodal reasoning, model distillation, and edge deployment. We explore how capable AI systems can be made smaller, faster, and more accessible without requiring hyperscale infrastructure.


Citation

If you use Apollo-VL-Edge-3B in your research or projects, please cite:

```bibtex @misc{apollo_vl_edge_3b, title = {Apollo-VL-Edge-3B: Elite Visual Reasoning on Edge Hardware}, author = {Siddharth N.R. and Pluto AI Labs}, year = {2026}, howpublished = {Hugging Face}, url = {https://huggingface.co/Pluto-AI-Labs/Apollo-VL-Edge-3B} } ```


Apollo-VL-Edge-3B · MLX FP16

Precision over scale. Reasoning at the edge.

Built by Pluto AI Labs

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