16GB vs 8GB RAM for Llama 3.1 8B (4-bit): 16GB is the minimum for comfortable use

16GB works fine with light multitasking—the model takes ~5-6GB, leaving 9-10GB free. 8GB is a hard no: you get ~2GB free after loading, causing heavy swapping that makes the model borderline unusable. Go to 32GB for larger models or heavier multitasking.