MiniCPM4-8B is not just another large language model, it’s a cutting-edge breakthrough that brings flagship-level performance to your local machine with outstanding efficiency. With 8 billion parameters trained on 8 trillion tokens, this model delivers top-tier natural language understanding and generation while being developed specifically for blazing-fast inference, even on edge devices. What sets MiniCPM4-8B apart is its meticulously optimized architecture that features InfLLM v2, a sparse attention mechanism that processes long text (up to 128K tokens) with just 5% of the usual computation. It’s further backed by the UltraClean and UltraChat v2 datasets, ensuring high-quality pretraining and fine-tuning, and powered by CPM.cu and ArkInfer for rapid, cross-platform deployment. If you’re building chatbots, research tools, or AI agents, MiniCPM4-8B gives you the ability of using a heavyweight LLM with the agility of an optimized lightweight system.
In this guide, you’ll learn how to install MiniCPM4-8B on your local machine or deploy it to the cloud within minutes.
Prerequisites
The minimum system requirements for running this model are:
Step-by-step process to install and run MiniCPM4 8B
For the purpose of this tutorial, we’ll use a GPU-powered Virtual Machine by NodeShift since it provides high compute Virtual Machines at a very affordable cost on a scale that meets GDPR, SOC2, and ISO27001 requirements. Also, it offers an intuitive and user-friendly interface, making it easier for beginners to get started with Cloud deployments. However, feel free to use any cloud provider of your choice and follow the same steps for the rest of the tutorial.
Step 1: Setting up a NodeShift Account
Visit app.nodeshift.com and create an account by filling in basic details, or continue signing up with your Google/GitHub account.
If you already have an account, login straight to your dashboard.
Step 2: Create a GPU Node
After accessing your account, you should see a dashboard (see image), now:
- Navigate to the menu on the left side.
- Click on the GPU Nodes option.
- Click on Start to start creating your very first GPU node.
These GPU nodes are GPU-powered virtual machines by NodeShift. These nodes are highly customizable and let you control different environmental configurations for GPUs ranging from H100s to A100s, CPUs, RAM, and storage, according to your needs.
Step 3: Selecting configuration for GPU (model, region, storage)
- For this tutorial, we’ll be using 1x RTX A6000 GPU, however, you can choose any GPU as per the prerequisites.
- Similarly, we’ll opt for 200GB storage by sliding the bar. You can also select the region where you want your GPU to reside from the available ones.
Step 4: Choose GPU Configuration and Authentication method
- After selecting your required configuration options, you’ll see the available GPU nodes in your region and according to (or very close to) your configuration. In our case, we’ll choose a 1x RTX A6000 48GB GPU node with 64vCPUs/63GB RAM/200GB SSD.
2. Next, you’ll need to select an authentication method. Two methods are available: Password and SSH Key. We recommend using SSH keys, as they are a more secure option. To create one, head over to our official documentation.
Step 5: Choose an Image
The final step is to choose an image for the VM, which in our case is Nvidia Cuda.
That’s it! You are now ready to deploy the node. Finalize the configuration summary, and if it looks good, click Create to deploy the node.
Step 6: Connect to active Compute Node using SSH
- As soon as you create the node, it will be deployed in a few seconds or a minute. Once deployed, you will see a status Running in green, meaning that our Compute node is ready to use!
- Once your GPU shows this status, navigate to the three dots on the right, click on Connect with SSH, and copy the SSH details that appear.
As you copy the details, follow the below steps to connect to the running GPU VM via SSH:
- Open your terminal, paste the SSH command, and run it.
2. In some cases, your terminal may take your consent before connecting. Enter ‘yes’.
3. A prompt will request a password. Type the SSH password, and you should be connected.
Output:
Next, If you want to check the GPU details, run the following command in the terminal:
!nvidia-smi
Step 7: Set up the project environment with dependencies
- Create a virtual environment using Anaconda.
conda create -n minicpm python=3.11 -y && conda activate minicpm
Output:
2. Once you’re inside the environment, install necessary dependencies to run the model.
pip install torch torchvision torchaudio einops timm pillow
pip install git+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers
pip install git+https://github.com/huggingface/accelerate
pip install git+https://github.com/huggingface/diffusers
pip install huggingface_hub
pip install sentencepiece bitsandbytes protobuf decord numpy
Output:
3. Install and run jupyter notebook.
conda install -c conda-forge --override-channels notebook -y
conda install -c conda-forge --override-channels ipywidgets -y
jupyter notebook --allow-root
4. If you’re on a remote machine (e.g., NodeShift GPU), you’ll need to do SSH port forwarding in order to access the jupyter notebook session on your local browser.
Run the following command in your local terminal after replacing:
<YOUR_SERVER_PORT> with the PORT allotted to your remote server (For the NodeShift server – you can find it in the deployed GPU details on the dashboard).
<PATH_TO_SSH_KEY> with the path to the location where your SSH key is stored.
<YOUR_SERVER_IP> with the IP address of your remote server.
ssh -L 8888:localhost:8888 -p <YOUR_SERVER_PORT> -i <PATH_TO_SSH_KEY> root@<YOUR_SERVER_IP>
Output:
After this copy the URL you received in your remote server:
And paste this on your local browser to access the Jupyter Notebook session.
Step 8: Download and Run the model
- Open a Python notebook inside Jupyter.
2. Download model checkpoints and run the model for inference.
from transformers import AutoModelForCausalLM, AutoTokenizer
import torch
torch.manual_seed(0)
path = 'openbmb/MiniCPM4-8B'
device = "cuda"
tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained(path)
model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(path, torch_dtype=torch.bfloat16, device_map=device, trust_remote_code=True)
messages = [
{"role": "user", "content": "Write an article about Artificial Intelligence."},
]
prompt_text = tokenizer.apply_chat_template(
messages,
tokenize=False,
add_generation_prompt=True,
)
model_inputs = tokenizer([prompt_text], return_tensors="pt").to(device)
model_outputs = model.generate(
**model_inputs,
max_new_tokens=1024,
top_p=0.7,
temperature=0.7
)
output_token_ids = [
model_outputs[i][len(model_inputs[i]):] for i in range(len(model_inputs['input_ids']))
]
responses = tokenizer.batch_decode(output_token_ids, skip_special_tokens=True)[0]
print(responses)
Output:
You can also run the model in chat interface using the below code snippet:
from transformers import AutoModelForCausalLM, AutoTokenizer
import torch
torch.manual_seed(0)
path = 'openbmb/MiniCPM4-8B'
device = "cuda"
tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained(path)
model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(path, torch_dtype=torch.bfloat16, device_map=device, trust_remote_code=True)
# User can directly use the chat interface
responds, history = model.chat(tokenizer, "Write a savvy twitter post about ", temperature=0.7, top_p=0.7)
print(responds)
Output:
Conclusion
In this guide, we explored how to install and run MiniCPM4-8B, one of the most efficient 8B-parameter language models available, either locally or on the cloud. From its sparse attention architecture and extreme quantization to high-quality training datasets and fast inference systems, MiniCPM4-8B is engineered for speed and scalability without compromising performance. When paired with NodeShift, deployment becomes even more seamless, offering pre-configured environments, GPU-ready instances, and simplified scaling to get your LLMs running in minutes. If you’re experimenting locally or deploying at scale, NodeShift ensures your LLM hosting experience is smooth, reliable, and production-ready.
