Nvidia’s upcoming GeForce RTX 5050 Mobile GPU may not offer a substantial specification uplift over its predecessor, RTX 4050 Mobile. The entry-level Blackwell chip has been spotted in new laptops packing the same core counts as its forebear, with GPU clock speeds and potentially memory bandwidth providing the only upgrades.
German brand Kiebel has spilt the beans on Nvidia’s RTX 5050 mobile GPU while unveiling its Helix 13 lineup. These laptops list the unannounced RTX 5050 Mobile featuring a 2,235MHz base clock and 2,520MHz boost. They also echo previous rumours regarding this GPU’s specifications, such as its 2,560 CUDA cores, 80 Tensor cores, 20 Ray Tracing cores, a 128-bit bus, and 8GB of GDDR6 VRAM.
Based on this leak, RTX 5050 Mobile looks almost identical to its predecessor, RTX 4050 Mobile. The main difference the newer GPU packs are base and boost frequencies (2,235 / 2,520 vs. 1,455 / 1,755) and a wider memory bus (128-bit vs. 96-bit). This should translate into performance increases, but it’s difficult to how much of a difference architectural improvements in tandem with these upgrades will make.
The efficiency improvements Blackwell offers should help improve cooling, theoretically making it easier to maintain higher clock speeds and push power budgets. Of course, this calls for a laptop with adequate cooling.
RTX 5050 Mobile laptops should’ve be massively expensive if Helix 13 price tags are anything to go by, sitting at around €1,429. Expect to see more models featuring the GPU emerge from other manufacturers in due course.
