Nvidia RTX 5090 and 5080 GPUs could be here in half a year, but scalpers could ruin this early launch

By James On Apr 15, 2024

Nvidia could release not just one, but two next-gen GPUs this year – and those graphics cards might be here sooner than you think (equip yourself with a salt shaker at this point).

YouTuber Moore’s Law is Dead (MLID) tells us that one of his top sources for Nvidia leaks just dropped the claim that Team Green is releasing the RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 – which will be strong candidates for our list of the best graphics cards. is preparing a Q4 launch. And that the company is even considering the possibility of a late Q3 release for these Blackwell GPUs.

This supports recent rumors pointing to a 2024 release for both products, although no one has mentioned a Q3 timeframe – let alone both graphics cards arriving late in Q3 (which would presumably be September).

However, we must underline the caveat that the source says there is only a slim chance of that launch happening in the third quarter.

Another source MLID spoke to (at a distributor) also claims that RTX 5000 GPUs will launch in the third or fourth quarter of 2024, although they add that they found this surprising.

So a September release is apparently still a possibility, and if this really is the case, we’ll only have another five months to wait before we see the RTX 5080 and 5090 hit the scene – not long at all. MLID is also raising the idea of an initial unveiling of these Blackwell GPUs at Computex (in June).

Additionally, MLID further shares a quote from a third source at a laptop manufacturer that takes a different line, saying that Blackwell mobile GPUs won’t be properly available until late in the first quarter of 2025 or perhaps even the second quarter.

Analysis: Should needs be determined by AI instincts?

So the last source seems quite contradictory to the others, but keep in mind that this leak is about laptop GPUs and not desktop graphics cards like the other two. However, Blackwell notebook products for Q1 2025 have been rumored before, and the mention of Q2 is a suggestion of a delay (you have to remember that this is all pre-release talk that should of course be seasoned with a handful of spices) are considered).

Looking at a late Q3 2024 release for desktop RTX 5000 and a Q2 2025 release for notebook GPUs (by volume), that seems like a pretty big gap. So, what gives?

Well, as source number two points out, the reason Nvidia might consider pushing back the initial salvo of RTX 5090 and 5080 desktop GPUs to perhaps September 2024 isn’t because it’s concerned about the release of RDNA 4 and how that could change the GPU landscape. After all, the rumor mill is pretty sure at this stage that AMD’s next generation of graphics cards will excel in the mid-range (although they will be powerful mid-range performers).

So these RDNA 4 products, if they were to arrive in Q3 2024, as some rumors have suggested (although others have equally pondered later launch timeframes), are not something Nvidia would have to worry about acquiring the RTX 5080 – they won’t be either. near its performance levels.

The source claims that an earlier launch of the RTX 5090 and 5080 would not be about RDNA 4 and what could happen there, but rather it would be a decision made because of Nvidia’s other products – the Blackwell heavyweight (AI) launches.

The problem is that when these AI GPUs arrive – which should be sooner rather than later, ideally due to the threat of AMD’s Instinct MI300X accelerators – it will all but give up the specs of the RTX 5000 high-end graphics cards. , so Nvidia actually feels like it needs to launch this one as a result. The big catch, however, is that the RTX 5080 and 5090 GPUs coming early (in Q3) would essentially be a paper launch.

In other words, Nvidia will reveal and market these RTX 5000 graphics cards – as they need to, since they use the exact same dies as the AI GPUs – but they won’t be in real quantities. These boards will sell out in no time, and they won’t hit shelves in the right quantities until late 2024 (according to the original rumors about this).

In short, this is a necessary tactical move from Nvidia – or it could be, because as mentioned, it’s not certain that Team Green will go this route anyway. It certainly wouldn’t have been the original plan to release the RTX 5080 in September 2024, as the RTX 4080 Super Refresh hasn’t been on the GPU scene for very long.