What can I use kimi-k3-in-c for?

Run the k3 program with the prompt "The capital of France is", and you get generated text starting with Paris plus a peak memory reading, 8.24 GB in the source. Give it the code prompt "def fibonacci(n):" with the server preset, and you get generated function code plus a report of time per token. Start chat mode with a system instruction and a history file, and you get a back-and-forth conversation saved in a transcript file.

What do I need to use kimi-k3-in-c?

About 1.7 TB free storage, 8 GB RAM or more, an AVX2 + FMA or NEON CPU, a C compiler with OpenMP, Python 3.9+ and a Hugging Face token with model access.

kimi-k3-in-c: Run a 2.78-trillion-parameter model on 8 GB of RAM

What it does

kimi-k3-in-c is an inference engine, a program that runs a trained AI model, written in portable C99 for the 2.78-trillion-parameter Kimi K3 model. It streams model data from disk as needed, so more memory only buys speed, and the source says output is byte-identical at every memory size. A token, the unit of output, is roughly a short word-piece.

How to use it

Download the code, build it with make and run make test, which needs no model and takes about a minute. To generate text, run the doctor script, fetch the 1.56 TB model checkpoint, pack it, then start the k3 program with a prompt.

Common use cases

Run the k3 program with the prompt "The capital of France is", and you get generated text starting with Paris plus a peak memory reading, 8.24 GB in the source.
Give it the code prompt "def fibonacci(n):" with the server preset, and you get generated function code plus a report of time per token.
Start chat mode with a system instruction and a history file, and you get a back-and-forth conversation saved in a transcript file.

Can I use this?

Setup details on the source page

Requirements Downloading the model needs a Hugging Face token with access to it. It runs locally on one CPU with no GPU (Linux on x86-64, macOS on arm64 or Windows on x86-64). Linux is the reference; the other two also build and pass every check.

Caveat A partial download fails quietly and produces wrong tokens. The chat transcript is sensitive: it keeps the model's reasoning as well as replies. This code is licensed under Apache-2.0; check the model's own terms where you download it.

Worth knowing Slow: 26.5 s per token at 8 GB, 5.6 s at 128 GB+, on a 124-core machine; below 128 GB the model is read from disk each step, so a slower drive is slower there.

Why it's here

1,920 people starred it on GitHub this week — 11,291 in total.

Numbers as of 8 November 2026, from BuildTube’s latest daily refresh.

Behind it

View setup guide

BuildTube has not run or verified this project. Everything above is written from what the creator published.

Made this?

Quick questions

What is kimi-k3-in-c?: kimi-k3-in-c is an inference engine, a program that runs a trained AI model, written in portable C99 for the 2.78-trillion-parameter Kimi K3 model.
What can I use kimi-k3-in-c for?: Run the k3 program with the prompt "The capital of France is", and you get generated text starting with Paris plus a peak memory reading, 8.24 GB in the source. Give it the code prompt "def fibonacci(n):" with the server preset, and you get generated function code plus a report of time per token. Start chat mode with a system instruction and a history file, and you get a back-and-forth conversation saved in a transcript file.
Can I run kimi-k3-in-c on my computer?: It runs locally on one CPU with no GPU (Linux on x86-64, macOS on arm64 or Windows on x86-64). Linux is the reference; the other two also build and pass every check.
What do I need to use kimi-k3-in-c?: About 1.7 TB free storage, 8 GB RAM or more, an AVX2 + FMA or NEON CPU, a C compiler with OpenMP, Python 3.9+ and a Hugging Face token with model access.
What license does kimi-k3-in-c use?: This code is licensed under Apache-2.0; check the model's own terms where you download it.

More from this week

agent-desktop Let AI agents read and click desktop apps
For developers building computer-use agents: agent-desktop lets an AI agent read and operate desktop apps on Mac, Windows or Linux from a command line.
+13,858 stars this weekAdded 3 Nov
Auto-Ontology Give AI agents checked business meanings for your database
Help AI agents answer questions about company databases using reviewed definitions and SQL, with each answer showing its steps.
+9,044 stars this weekNeeds a local setupAdded 4 Nov
Spec Kit Turn a written spec into plans, tasks and code
Spec Kit gives your AI coding agent a step-by-step process to build a feature, fix a bug or assess an idea.
+4,280 stars this weekAdded 2 Nov

Related projects

ai-engineering-from-scratch A 542-lesson free course that teaches AI engineering by building
Same topic: deep-learning
Try in browserAdded 28 Sept
Transformers Load and run almost any open AI model from one Python library
Same topic: deep-learning
Runs in a terminalAdded 20 Sept
vLLM Serve language model answers to applications
Same topic: llm
Runs in a terminalAdded 27 Oct
Higgsfield Train huge AI models across many machines without the usual pain
Same topic: deep-learning
Runs in a terminalAdded 25 Sept
prompts.chat Find and share ready-made prompts for AI chatbots
Same topic: llm
Hosted serviceAdded 1 Nov
supervision Add boxes, tracking and zone counts on top of any vision model
Same topic: deep-learning
Runs in a terminalAdded 25 Sept

Explore by topic

Post this

For makers

Made this? Show it’s on BuildTube — add the badge to your README or embed the card on your site.

README badge (Markdown)

[![Featured on BuildTube](https://buildtube.app/badge/gh-fareedkhan-dev-kimi-k3-in-c.svg)](https://buildtube.app/p/gh-fareedkhan-dev-kimi-k3-in-c/)

Embed card (HTML)

<iframe src="https://buildtube.app/embed/gh-fareedkhan-dev-kimi-k3-in-c/" width="560" height="240" style="border:0;max-width:100%" loading="lazy" title="kimi-k3-in-c on BuildTube"></iframe>