Nvidia may have let the genie out of the bottle as RTX 5070 Ti has crossed the $1,000 milestone. Recent price hikes of the company’s consumer GPUs show that MSRPs truly mean nothing, and that new hardware is fast becoming an option only for those with deep pockets.
A couple of weeks ago, many rumours, including reports from reputable outlets, claimed that Nvidia may have ended the RTX 5070 Ti production to focus on other models. One of the reasons advanced was these models’ higher 16GB memory requirement, which could instead be leveraged to make two 8GB 5060 Ti. As expected, Asus – likely pressured by Nvidia – has back-pedalled as soon as everyone picked up the news, stating that the RTX 5070 Ti and RTX 5060 Ti 16GB aren’t end-of-life (EOL), and that sales will continue for the foreseeable future.
Shortly after, YouTuber der8auer released a video in which he spoke about the end of Nvidia’s OPP cashback scheme. This program allegedly allowed Nvidia’s add-in board partners to maintain some RTX 50 models at or around MSRP. In other words, partners will no longer be incentivised to produce and sell cards at MSRP.
Two weeks later, here we are, and those same RTX 5070 Tis that were around $749 are now at $899. And that’s for the cheapest, most basic model, which isn’t available at all retailers. Anything else is above $1,000. Yep, the RTX 5070 Ti now sits where the RTX 5080 should be. At Newegg for example, the cheapest model on sale demands $1,099.
As a reminder, the RTX 5070 Ti MSRP is supposed to be $749, meaning that value options should be at least within a reasonable range, not $350 above. Is it a simple coincidence or the result of the OPP program termination? I’ll let you be the judge.
That said, this situation seems to only fully affect the US for now; UK pricing is less inflated, as you can still find RTX 5070 Ti cards at £799. While options such as the MSI RTX 5070 Ti Ventus 3X, which debuted at the £729 MSRP, is now £899, a good selection is still within a reasonable range from MSRP.
It seems that rougher days are ahead for gamers. Everything has become expensive: GPUs, RAM, and even storage are slowly slipping out of the reach of many. The only sensible thing to do, for value-hunters like me, is to weather the storm and make do with what you have or try your luck with second-hand hardware.
