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1Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsMeta announced Muse Spark Open on October 15, 2026, as an open-weight model designed for coding, agentic workflows and long-horizon reasoning. Meta says it can run locally across two Mac Studios equipped with M5 Ultra, using Apple’s MLX framework and up to a terabyte of combined unified memory.
The important qualification is hardware: the launch materials confirm the advertised two-Mac setup, not that one ordinary Mac Studio can hold the complete unquantized model. Meta has not published a single-Mac performance result, street price or power test.
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What Muse Spark Open is
Muse Spark Open is a natively multimodal, open-weight system from Meta AI Research. Meta lists 816 billion total parameters, 42 billion active parameters and a context window of 1 million tokens. The distinction between total and active parameters matters: the total figure describes the model’s full capacity, while the active figure describes the parameters used for a given operation.
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Meta positions the model for difficult software engineering, multi-step reasoning and tasks that continue for a long time without constant human intervention. Because the weights are available, organizations can choose hosted inference or deploy and customize the model themselves, subject to the hardware and software requirements of their chosen configuration.
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- This pre-owned product is not Apple certified, but has been professionally inspected, tested and cleaned by Amazon-qualified suppliers. There will be no visible cosmetic imperfections when held at an arm’s length. There will be no visible cosmetic imperfections when held at an arm’s length. This product will have a battery which exceeds 80% capacity relative to new. Accessories will not be original, but will be compatible and fully functional. Product may come in generic Box. This product is eligible for a replacement or refund within 90 days of receipt if you are not satisfied.
Why Meta used two Mac Studios
Meta says it optimized Muse Spark Open with Apple’s MLX framework on two Mac Studios containing M5 Ultra chips. Each machine can expose up to 512 GB of unified memory, and Meta states that M5 Ultra provides memory bandwidth of 1.2 TB/s. In the company’s description, the two computers work together as a single system with roughly one terabyte of unified memory, allowing the complete model to be held across the pair.
| Specification | Meta’s launch figure | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Total parameters | 816 billion | The model’s full parameter count |
| Active parameters | 42 billion | Parameters active for an individual operation, according to Meta’s description |
| Context window | 1 million tokens | Designed for very long documents, codebases and multi-step sessions |
| Unified memory per M5 Ultra Mac Studio | Up to 512 GB | Apple system memory available to the model and other workloads |
| M5 Ultra memory bandwidth | 1.2 TB/s | Bandwidth figure stated by Meta for the chip |
The two-machine demonstration should not be read as a universal minimum for every possible quantization or inference build. Quantized weights, memory-saving techniques and future software changes could alter requirements. Conversely, the announcement does not establish that a single Mac Studio can load the entire unquantized model, so buyers should not assume that one 512 GB system is sufficient.
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- BRILLLLLLIANT — iMac is the ultimate all-in-one desktop computer, powered by the M4 chip and built for Apple Intelligence.* With a stunning 24-inch Retina display, iMac gives you the space you need in an iconic, colorful design that livens up any room.
- FITS PERFECTLY IN YOUR SPACE — The all-in-one desktop design is strikingly thin, comes in seven vibrant colors, and elevates any space with style.
- BUILT FOR APPLE INTELLIGENCE — Apple Intelligence is the personal intelligence system that helps you write, express yourself, and get things done effortlessly. With groundbreaking privacy protections, it gives you peace of mind that no one else can access your data — not even Apple.*
- SUPERCHARGED BY M4 — Get more done faster with the Apple M4 chip. From editing photos to creating presentations to gaming, you’ll fly through work and play.
- IMMERSIVE DISPLAY — The industry-leading 24-inch 4.5K Retina display features 500 nits of brightness and supports up to 1 billion colors.*
What Meta demonstrated
Muse Code and iOS development
In an on-device demonstration, Meta showed Muse Code making changes to Ice Cubes, an open-source Mastodon client for iOS, and shipping those changes. The example is intended to show an agent handling a software task across multiple steps rather than merely completing an isolated code-generation prompt.
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Another demonstration had the model control DaVinci Resolve, inspect footage frame by frame, identify strong moments and crop selected clips vertically. That combines visual understanding with application control, which is the kind of multimodal, agentic workflow Meta is targeting.
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These are vendor demonstrations. They illustrate the intended capabilities, but they are not independent benchmark results and do not establish that Muse Spark Open outperforms other models on coding, video editing or general reasoning.
Can Muse Spark Open run on a Mac Studio?
Yes, in the specific configuration Meta advertised: two M5 Ultra Mac Studios connected to expose their combined memory. The launch announcement does not prove that a single ordinary Mac Studio can run the full, unquantized model, nor does it provide throughput, latency or energy measurements for either one-machine or two-machine use.
Rank #4
- BRILLLLLLIANT — iMac is the ultimate all-in-one desktop computer, powered by the M4 chip and built for Apple Intelligence.* With a stunning 24-inch Retina display, iMac gives you the space you need in an iconic, colorful design that livens up any room.
- FITS PERFECTLY IN YOUR SPACE — The all-in-one desktop design is strikingly thin, comes in seven vibrant colors, and elevates any space with style.
- BUILT FOR APPLE INTELLIGENCE — Apple Intelligence is the personal intelligence system that helps you write, express yourself, and get things done effortlessly. With groundbreaking privacy protections, it gives you peace of mind that no one else can access your data — not even Apple.*
- SUPERCHARGED BY M4 — Get more done faster with the Apple M4 chip. From editing photos to creating presentations to gaming, you’ll fly through work and play.
- IMMERSIVE DISPLAY — The industry-leading 24-inch 4.5K Retina display features 500 nits of brightness and supports up to 1 billion colors.*
- Advertised configuration: two M5 Ultra Mac Studios, each with up to 512 GB of unified memory.
- Framework: Apple’s MLX, used by Meta for the Mac deployment.
- Practical implication: the setup is a proof of concept for powerful local AI on Apple hardware, but it is a substantial desktop installation rather than a typical single-computer chatbot setup.
Ways to access and deploy the model
Meta lists several hosted API providers for users who do not want to operate the hardware themselves:
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- Baseten
- Fireworks AI
- Groq
- Modal
- Nebius
- OpenRouter
- Together AI
For model-weight distribution, Meta names Amazon SageMaker AI, Google Cloud Model Garden, Hugging Face and Microsoft Foundry Models. Availability, pricing, rate limits and regional access can differ by provider, so the launch announcement should not be treated as a single universal commercial offer.
Best Value
- BRAWN OF A NEW AGE — Mac Studio is a tremendously powerful pro desktop. The M5 Max chip enables remarkable on-device AI compute. Blast through creative projects and professional workflows with the advanced graphics architecture and faster memory and storage.
- M5 MAX CHIP — Tap into breakthrough performance with a next-generation CPU, a more powerful GPU with third-generation ray tracing, and a Neural Accelerator built into each GPU core. Mac Studio gets a boost with more power to generate real-time media and accelerate complex workflows.
- MEMORY AND STORAGE — Get up to 128GB unified memory and up to 614GB/s memory bandwidth for more speed when processing massive datasets, complex 3D scenes, and inference in AI workflows. And up to 2x faster storage* expedites tasks like file transfers and loading large projects.
- A POWERFUL PLATFORM FOR AI — Apple silicon, and every major component that powers it, is designed to run demanding AI workflows like running huge LLMs, directly on device. And Apple Intelligence* helps you write, express yourself, and get things done effortlessly, while Siri AI* is your profoundly capable assistant — all with groundbreaking privacy protections.
- A POWERFUL PLATFORM FOR AI — Apple silicon, and every major component that powers it, is designed to run demanding AI workflows like running huge LLMs, directly on device.
The model is listed as compatible with SGLang, vLLM, TensorRT-LLM, Hugging Face Transformers, Apple MLX, llama.cpp and Unsloth. Meta also points to PyTorch for customization. This gives developers several paths: managed APIs for speed, standard inference servers for data-center deployments, or MLX and related tools for Apple-based local experiments.
Safety claims and their limits
Meta says it evaluated Muse Spark Open under its Meta Superintelligence Scaling Framework, which covers the most severe risks considered in that process, and that the model met the thresholds required for release. That is Meta’s own safety assessment. The launch announcement does not provide an independent audit, so organizations with high-risk use cases should perform their own red-teaming, access controls, monitoring and deployment review.
How to compare Muse Spark Open with other local models
Meta’s description calls Muse Spark Open highly capable, but that wording is not an independent ranking. A meaningful comparison should use the same hardware, quantization, software stack and task set, then examine:
- Total parameters versus active parameters
- Context-window length and how performance changes near the limit
- Native multimodal inputs and supported application-control workflows
- Coding and agentic-task reliability, including how often human correction is needed
- Memory requirements, model format and expected throughput
- Compatibility with inference software such as MLX, vLLM or llama.cpp
- Whether weights can be self-managed or are available only through a hosted API
- How clearly the developer discloses safety testing and residual risks
What the launch does—and does not—establish
Muse Spark Open is significant because it combines open weights, a 1-million-token context window and a parameter scale normally associated with large data-center systems, while demonstrating a two-Mac- Studio deployment. Meta is presenting that deployment as a proof of concept for powerful local AI systems. Axios reported that Meta characterized it as the company’s most powerful U.S.-developed open-weight model. Meta AI chief Alexandr Wang described the release with the line, “We’re excited for mommy and daddy to be playing nice again.”
Still, launch-day information leaves several practical questions unanswered: there is no independent benchmark table, no published street price for the required hardware, no power-consumption test and no measured performance result for a single Mac Studio. Those gaps matter when deciding between local operation and a hosted endpoint. The confirmed conclusion is narrower but useful: Meta has shown Muse Spark Open running across two M5 Ultra Mac Studios, and it has released a software and hosting ecosystem intended to make the model accessible beyond that demonstration.
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