Up For Debate - What is the most you would spend on a new graphics card?

Written by Chad Norton on Sun, Nov 15, 2020 5:00 PM

It’s coming up to Christmas, and we’ve all been really excited by the new graphics cards from Nvidia and AMD. Now whilst these are the more enthusiast level of GPUs, usually the mid-range and mainstream cards find the most popularity due to their ratio between price and performance.

GPUs ain’t cheap, and you can normally find a one for the same price or cheaper than a brand new console - and that’s without the rest of the kit needed for a fully fledged PC setup. But with rising costs now starting to become the new norm, what would you now reasonably pay for a new graphics card?

Money is a fickle thing, and as much as we’d like to see the same GPU successors stay at the same price every year, inflation is a thing and products cost more and more money as time moves on. It sucks, but it’s the natural flow of the economy, or something like that… look I didn’t study economics at college okay?

But Nvidia’s recent leap into the ray tracing industry with their RTX GPUs marked a period where the graphics cards jumped up in price from $299 for the GTX 1060 to $349 for the RTX 2060. The GTX 1070 also jumped up from $379 to $499 for the RTX 2070, and the GTX 1080 from $599 to $699 for the RTX 2080.

Of course, this wasn’t exactly new considering the jump from the GTX 9 series to the GTX 10 series was fairly similar. But now the RTX 30 cards, whilst at the same price points of the RTX 20 series, are at an all time high for GPU costs. 

Maybe this is part of that economical cycle of life, and maybe that’s why the new RTX 30 series and even the new next-gen consoles aren’t quite as expensive as we all thought they would be, because these companies knew the prices were getting out of hand. Or maybe AMD finally brought up the competition with their RX 6000 cards which forced competitors to reduce their prices. Either way, I think we can all agree that the new graphics cards are still pretty expensive.

So with consoles becoming more and more like entry level PC computers, and the costs of PC hardware rising, we want to know what is the most you would reasonably pay for a new GPU?

Do you like to wait for the entry level GPUs and get decent performance at a low price point? Or do you save up for that top end GPU available for best performance? Are graphics cards getting too expensive? And how much is too much money for a new graphics card? Let us know!

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18:40 Nov-18-2020

I waited so many years to buy a GTX 1080 in 2019 for just under $300, and what do you know? It's still kicking, demolishing anything I throw at it @ 1440p 60+ fps

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junior admin badge
23:48 Nov-18-2020

Glad it's serving you well.

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15:33 Nov-17-2020

Where's the poll lmao.
But for real, 250 euro is more than enough. Hopefully that's 3050ti level, because in the past, this money would get you a 60 series..

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21:51 Nov-16-2020

My graphic card money tops at about 500-600EUR. Like there is no way I am spending insane amounts higher end stuff cost. No offense to anyone who does. But I just can't get behind idea of spending more, regardless of how much I could afford it. Especially since I do remember old days with what I would call more normal pricing.

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12:03 Nov-16-2020

I live in Europe with a US bank account, take that conversion into account haha. I paid about 520€ on my Vega 64 on release day, its been a beast ever since and so reliable on water. If a 6800 xt comes close ish in price ill probably get it, i play on ultrawide with freesync capped at 73fps, i can still wreck in competitive games so never saw a need for 144hz, and more power consumption.

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11:51 Nov-16-2020

Depends 100% on how comfortable I am feeling financially. I think the minimum I'd spend is -$250 if things were tight and I'd aim for 1080p/60fps.

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09:46 Nov-16-2020

Depends on how much my CPU will cost. Around 300-350eur at the most.

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09:28 Nov-16-2020

since im not earning any money low-mid end. Like GTX 750-760-760ti (i started building this pc when these cards were out and i bought gtx 760 ti) cards for example. When i start earning money i will buy high-high end PC. Like 770-780 with some i7 CPU and 2x16GB DDR4.

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08:41 Nov-16-2020

Current plan is to upgrade to an RTX 3070, in India its about 805.50 USD (AIB partner version)

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06:53 Nov-16-2020

Max 800 euros, anything above that isnt worth it for me.

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05:35 Nov-16-2020

only got a 60hz monitor so $350 is my max

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04:44 Nov-16-2020

For me the absolute most would be $450.00 CAD or about $350.00 USD. My goal is to buy a RTX 3060 or 3060Ti in January to match it to my i5 9600K 16GB RAM rig on a Samsung Odyssey G5 32" 1440P 144Hz monitor!

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04:24 Nov-16-2020

$ 350 bucks, not realy a reson to go for a 1000 gpu when i have a 1080p 60hz monitor

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04:19 Nov-16-2020

Well after taxes and stuff I ended up paying $740 for my 2070 SUPER so I guess that's my answer

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04:31 Nov-16-2020

F, that sucks man , where do u live?

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06:59 Nov-16-2020

Sri Lanka

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03:54 Nov-16-2020

$300 to me is reasonable. I just want to able to play a game at solid 60FPS - 120 FPS. Maybe if its with the times and that. But other than that. Games arn't making big big jumps lately for pc specs so i haven't had the need to upgrade at all.

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04:32 Nov-16-2020

You are playing ps3 and esport titles right? no way that gpu you have is enough for AA games

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16:08 Nov-16-2020

My pc specs can play the new Cyberpunk man. I've had this rig for a good 3-4 years now. Still can withstand a lot of games. Even the CPU.

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01:45 Nov-16-2020

Idk, I would have to ask my wife :P

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01:18 Nov-16-2020

$450 USD was the max I've spent on graphics card, with intent to see out my build without upgrading it. I use 1080p still since 1440p and 4k high refresh screens are still expensive in Australia, and it helps with gaming longevity also.

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00:42 Nov-16-2020

1000 usd max for gpu, max 2000 usd for the total price

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junior admin badge
10:18 Nov-16-2020

I'm assuming you mean 2000 for the entire system.

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junior admin badge
23:51 Nov-15-2020

Is it me or is the voting option missing in this article?

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22:39 Nov-15-2020

£500 is the most i'm willing to pay, but I do think they're getting too expensive. Iike, the new AMD cards should be £700 at the most expensive, not £1000

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22:05 Nov-15-2020

700€ is my breaking point. I considered buying a 3080 but once i saw that the 700€ msrp was only something to put in the title of a tech youtubers video i switched my attention too the 3070 and the rx 6800. Even considering buying a ps5 since i get an entire console for the price of a gpu.

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22:06 Nov-15-2020

Also I just cant see the argument "you can buy a more powerful pc than a console for cheaper" working anymore since they started making update versions of consoles. PC gaming is getting too expensive for my blood.

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23:43 Nov-15-2020

Sadly the trend is likely to continue, so I'm afraid I have to agree with you.

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Can They Run... |

| 60FPS, Ultra, 1080p
Ryzen 7 5800X 8-Core 3.8GHz GeForce RTX 3070 Gigabyte Gaming OC 8GB 32GB
| 60FPS, Medium, 1080p
Core i7-8750H 6-Core 2.2GHz GeForce GTX 1050 8GB
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Ryzen 5 5600 6-Core 3.5GHz GeForce GTX 1070 Ti Digital Alliance Dual 8GB 16GB
| 60FPS, Ultra, 1080p
Core i9-11900H 8-Core 2.10GHz GeForce RTX 3060 Ultra 32GB
100% Yes [1 votes]
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Core i5-10400F 6-Core 2.90GHz Radeon RX 6600 8GB 16GB
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Core i3-10100 4-Core 3.60GHz GeForce RTX 2060 Super Gigabyte Windforce OC (Rev. 2.0) 8GB 16GB
| 60FPS, Medium, 1080p
Core i3-10100 4-Core 3.60GHz GeForce RTX 2060 Super Gigabyte Windforce OC (Rev. 2.0) 8GB 16GB
50% Yes [2 votes]
| 60FPS, Medium, 1080p
Core i7-4770 4-Core 3.4GHz GeForce GTX 1050 MSI 2GB 8GB
100% Yes [1 votes]
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Ryzen 3 3100 4-Core 3.6GHz GeForce RTX 3050 16GB
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Ryzen 3 3100 4-Core 3.6GHz GeForce RTX 3050 16GB
20% No [5 votes]
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Ryzen 3 3100 4-Core 3.6GHz GeForce RTX 3050 16GB
100% Yes [3 votes]
Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Radeon RX 570 Sapphire Nitro+ 8GB 16GB
100% Yes [1 votes]
| 60FPS, Low, 1080p
Ryzen 5 5500U 6-Core 2.1GHz GeForce GTX 1650 16GB
100% Yes [1 votes]
| 60FPS, Ultra, 1080p
Ryzen R5 1600 Radeon RX 580 Sapphire Nitro+ 8GB 16GB
25% No [4 votes]
| 60FPS, Ultra, 1440p
Ryzen 7 5800X 8-Core 3.8GHz GeForce RTX 3090 Zotac Gaming Trinity 24GB 32GB
100% Yes [1 votes]
| 60FPS, High, 1080p
Ryzen 3 3100 4-Core 3.6GHz GeForce RTX 3050 16GB
| 30FPS, High, 1080p
Ryzen 5 2600 GeForce GTX 1660 Gigabyte OC 6GB 16GB
0% No [2 votes]
| 60FPS, Low, 1080p
Ryzen 5 5500U 6-Core 2.1GHz GeForce GTX 1650 16GB
| 60FPS, High, 1440p
Ryzen 7 5800X 8-Core 3.8GHz Radeon RX 6900 XT 16GB 32GB
100% Yes [1 votes]
| 60FPS, Medium, 720p
Core i5-10300H 4-Core 2.50GHz GeForce GTX 1650 8GB
100% Yes [2 votes]