GeForce RTX 4090 Reportedly Peaks at 493W to Hit 3.1 GHz

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With great performance comes great power draw

GeForce RTX 4090
GeForce RTX 4090 (Image credit: Nvidia)

There's no denying that Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4090 will be one of the best graphics cards once it launches on October 12. However, the Ada-powered graphics card will consume considerable power to offer groundbreaking performance.

The GeForce RTX 4090 carries a TDP rating of 450W. It's not the first time an Nvidia graphics card has had a colossal power envelope. The GeForce RTX 3090 Ti, the last generation's flagship, also flaunted the 450W badge. Regarding power supply capacity, Nvidia's recommendation remains the same: 850W, at least for the Founders Edition. Some over-engineered custom models, which sport heavy factory overclocks, require a 1,200W power supply. At any rate, consumers don't have to spend a small fortune for a new power supply as long as their units comply with the recommended capacity.

The newly leaked screenshots, courtesy of Twitter user wxnod, showed the GeForce RTX 4090 operating at 2,730 MHz. The Ada flagship has a 2,230 MHz base clock and a 2,520 MHz boost clock. Therefore, the GeForce RTX 4090 was running above Nvidia's specifications. The GPU's temperature was 65.6 degrees Celsius, with the hot spot at 74.4 degrees Celsius. Those are great results considering that the cooling fans were only at 40% of their capacity. The graphics card was seemingly drawing 446.9W, so it's safe to assume it was running at stock without overclocking.

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GeForce RTX 4090
GeForce RTX 4090(Image credit: wxnod/Twitter)

The second screenshot revealed the GeForce RTX 4090 with a peak clock speed of 3,135 MHz. It would seem that the temperatures didn't go up substantially. GPU-Z recorded 68.2 degrees Celsius, a 4% increase over the previous result. The power consumption jumped up to 492.8W, around 10% higher. Sadly, the Twitter user didn't provide any context to the screenshots, so we don't know what workload the GeForce RTX 4090 was executing or whether manual overclocking was involved.

The GeForce RTX 4090 will launch on October 12 at $1,599. However, the premium models with fancy designs and liquid coolers will probably retail for nearly $2,000. The GeForce RTX 4080 won't be far behind, with a scheduled launch next month at $1,199 for the 16GB model and $899 for the 12GB variant.

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Zhiye Liu
Zhiye Liu
News Editor and Memory Reviewer

Zhiye Liu is a news editor and memory reviewer at Tom’s Hardware. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

22 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Nine Layer Nige
    It's getting to a point where the GPU will need to be housed in a separate case just for the GPU as its unfair to the rest of the pc components to have to put up with getting roasted in a hot box.
    There...the next big thing in PC enthusiast hyper-market...the nVidiaGBOX. you read it here first 😎
    Reply
  • ezst036
    Nine Layer Nige said:
    It's getting to a point where the GPU will need to be housed in a separate case just for the GPU as its unfair to the rest of the pc components to have to put up with getting roasted in a hot box.
    There...the next big thing in PC enthusiast hyper-market...the nVidiaGBOX. you read it here first 😎

    Aren't there already Thunderbolt attached eGPUs?
    Reply
  • JTWrenn
    Am I the only one who can't get over the exact same look? I mean, no changes at all to the color scheme or design is kind of weird to me. I know it is minor and I don't usually care but man, just nothing is odd.
    Reply
  • dehjomz
    Soon a video card won't be an accessory that slots into a motherboard, soon the motherboard will be the accessory.
    Reply
  • CMcDVic
    dehjomz said:
    Soon a video card won't be an accessory that slots into a motherboard, soon the motherboard will be the accessory.
    All they need is about 10 USB ports
    Reply
  • JarredWaltonGPU
    JTWrenn said:
    Am I the only one who can't get over the exact same look? I mean, no changes at all to the color scheme or design is kind of weird to me. I know it is minor and I don't usually care but man, just nothing is odd.
    There are definitely changes to the design, though superficially the 4090 FE looks like the 3090 FE:
    https://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-rtx-4090-unboxing
    It's a bit thicker, not quite as long, same height, same weight. There's a slight "curve" to the silver/gray casing on the 4090.

    Not every generation gets a full reworking of the GPU design. GTX 680, 780, 980, and 1080 were all similar blower designs, with modest updates to the fans, fins, etc. It's only 20-series (complete new design) and 30-series (another design overhaul) that really changed things. I do have to say, I think one of the major reasons for Nvidia's 30-series (and now 40-series) Founders Edition designs was just to move one of the fans to the opposite side of the card to reduce measured noise in testing. I always find the exterior of the 30-series cards get VERY got while under load.
    Reply
  • slash3
    It's worth noting that neither of those screenshots were tested at ambient temperatures. Those are chilled loop temperatures. Nothing too crazy, but don't expect to see anything similar out of the box.
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    slash3 said:
    It's worth noting that neither of those screenshots were tested at ambient temperatures. Those are chilled loop temperatures. Nothing too crazy, but don't expect to see anything similar out of the box.
    There was no chiller used for this test. Minimum temperature was measured at 40C. If a chiller was used, that should be in single digits. The 4090 FE reportedly runs at about 50-55C under load.

    A previous leak showed a 4090 using 616W while running Furmark and the GPU temperature was 46C. That was using a chiller. This test hitting 65.6C while "only" using 493W is using a retail cooler.
    Reply
  • BillyBuerger
    Some over-engineered custom models, which sport heavy factory overclocks, require a 1,200W power supply
    Semantics, but as the article that was linked to states, it's a recommended PSU wattage. A 450W GPU can't require a 1,200W or it wouldn't be a 450W GPU. If they factor overclock it, then they should provide the power required for what that is so that people can make the appropriate calculations for themselves instead of just throwing out some random number that means nothing without the context of the other parts involved.
    Reply
  • OriginFree
    dehjomz said:
    Soon a video card won't be an accessory that slots into a motherboard, soon the motherboard will be the accessory.

    Or we'll need a new format for cases. Standard or mini ATX for the main board and a half ATX sized GPU.
    Reply