Nvidia’s RTX 50-series might give us a repeat of the GPU shortage

Nvidia’s RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 are set to release later this month, and there’s no doubt that they’ll end up being some of the best graphics cards of the year. Unfortunately, it also seems that they might be hard to come by, as many sources expect that the RTX 50-series will have very limited availability to start with.  If this checks out, we might see a similar situation to the GPU shortage we endured during the launch of the RTX 30-series.

VideoCardz compiled a number of leaks that all add up to the same thing: Nvidia and its partners may not be able to supply many next-gen GPUs in time for the launch date. This wouldn’t necessarily mean that the official January 30 release date would get pushed — that’s pretty unlikely at this point. Instead, the GPUs might be up for sale, but limited in number, and they won’t be restocked for some time.

There are a lot of sources for these claims, which only serves to give them more weight, and some of these sources are highly reputable. Take PowerGPU, for instance, which is a custom PC building company. The brand took to X (Twitter) to share an ominous prediction: “The launch of the RTX 5090 will be the worst when it comes to availability.” Worse yet, PowerGPU was told that this situation won’t improve for the first three months.

Warning you all now.

The launch of the RTX 5090 will be the worst when it comes to availability. Already being told to expect it to be that way for the first 3 months.

— PowerGPU (@PowerGPU) January 21, 2025

A representative for Zotac Korea seems to believe much the same. As shared on TagTag, Zotac’s RTX 5090 won’t be available until February. The company predicts availability early in the month, but it could be pushed up to mid-February. It’s unclear whether the RTX 5080 will also be affected.

The statement points to external factors as the reason behind the shortage, and Benchlife sheds some life on the matter. Benchlife is usually a reliable source for hardware leaks, but of course, take the following with some skepticism. The publication claims that although both the RTX 5090 and the RTX 5080 will be released on January 30, there’s nowhere near enough supply. Benchlife cites “communication issues between Nvidia and its add-in card (AIC) partners” as the reason.

What does it mean for those who want to buy an RTX 5090 or an RTX 5080 at launch? Well, it might be a rough few weeks until availability stabilizes. Some cards may — once again — land in the hands of scalpers, and that’d push the already expensive RTX 5090 to a whole new level of “overpriced.” Considering that models made by Nvidia’s partners will cost more than the $2,000 recommended list price (MSRP), it’s easy to imagine scalper prices hitting $2,500 and above.

The RTX 30-series launched in the middle of the GPU shortage, and that was brutal. Restocks sold out in seconds and scalpers were reselling the cards at a huge premium. Things are highly unlikely to get that bad this time around, but those who want an early start with the RTX 50-series might have to hold off.

For now, all we can do is wait until January 30 to see whether these worrying reports turn out to be true.