There are only a few days left until Nvidia officially announces the RTX 50 series. A number of leakers have already shared information about the specs of Nvidia’s best upcoming graphics card, but the price has remained a mystery until now. YouTuber Vex shared his claims about Nvidia’s RTX 5080 pricing, and it looks like we may have a repeat of the previous generation on hand, and then some.
Before we get into it, here’s the obligatory disclaimer. There is no way to verify the authenticity of this leak. Vex was reportedly contacted by someone working at a retail store in Australia, who provided a screenshot listing a number of Asus RTX 5080 graphics cards, as well as some basic specs and prices. He gave it to me. It could be true or it could be fake, we don’t know at this point. One thing is for sure, though: if this is true, it’s not good news for gamers.
The screenshots list the RTX 5080 as having 16GB of memory, which is consistent with previous leaks, but it’s unclear whether it will use faster VRAM modules as some have said. . The complete list is for the Asus Prime GeForce RTX 5080 16GB OC, which means an overclocked card.
Next is the price. The first line lists the purchase price. This means the amount this Australian retailer had to pay to purchase the card from ASUS. The second line is the actual list price, meaning how much it would cost to buy one of these GPUs. The purchase price was AUD 2,544, and the list price is a whopping AUD 2,799.
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Fortunately, exchange rates make that pricing sound much scarier than it actually is. Converting from Australian dollars to US dollars, we find that the purchase price is approximately $1,581 and the sale price is approximately $1,740 at the time of writing. It is also important to note that these prices include sales tax. Sales tax is not included in the US.
No matter how you look at it, $1,740 for an RTX 5080 seems like a lot. Some rumors say the 5080’s performance will be at about the same level as the 4090, but it may fall short of expectations, making its pricing even harder to swallow.
We’re already seeing signs that the RTX 5080 could be expensive. Take, for example, this leaked Acer Predator Orion listing. The RTX 5080-equipped version cost around $3,640. But not all hope is lost.
Even if we assume all of the above is true and this unknown Australian retailer will soon be selling an RTX 5080 for the equivalent of $1,740, considering the fact that this is an Asus-made card and an overclocked one. Must be. . Nvidia’s suggested list price (MSRP) is likely to be set at a more modest level. Board partners tend to increase the price by several hundred dollars more. Founders Edition and non-OC versions are always cheaper.
Nvidia’s RTX 4080 launched at a price of $1,200, but many thought that was too expensive. The Super version fixes that problem and brings the price down to $1,000. Could Nvidia then turn around and bring the RTX 5080 price back up to $1,200-$1,500? I hope not. We’ll know more on January 6th, when Nvidia officially announces the graphics card.
