Graphics Card Prices Slid Another 14% in June, Down 57% Since January

Graphics card prices, a bunch of test GPUs
(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)

Graphics card prices continue to drop, both at retail and for aftermarket used cards sold on eBay. We've pulled together the data for the current prices, and the GPU mining exodus is in full force. eBay prices for the best graphics cards (meaning current generation hardware) fell by 14% on average since June 1, and previous-gen cards dropped by 17% on average. Retail prices aren't dropping as quickly, and many places are making noise about "graphics card deals" in an apparent attempt to clear inventory at the highest price possible. We tracked a 3% drop in retail prices on average, with prices on a few cards even increasing slightly.

Changes since the start of 2022 are even more dramatic, falling 57% on average. Retail availability of most graphics cards at the start of the year was close to non-existent. GPU mining was still profitable, and anyone that really wanted a modern graphics card immediately generally had to turn to eBay and pay exorbitant prices. Things have changed, and many miners are likely operating at a net loss right now. The solution for many is to sell off their used graphics cards as quickly as possible, and the resulting downward price trend is clear to see.

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Graphics Cards — 2022 Price Change
Header Cell - Column 0 eBay Price on July 1eBay Price on Jan 1Retail Price on July 1GPU MSRPeBay YTD ChangeRetail vs eBay PriceRetail vs MSRP
GeForce RTX 3090 Ti$1,387$1,670$2,00020%-17%
GeForce RTX 3090$1,043$2,918$1,459$1,500-64%40%-3%
GeForce RTX 3080 Ti$921$1,992$1,075$1,200-54%17%-10%
GeForce RTX 3080 12GB$812$800N/A ($800?)-1%0%
GeForce RTX 3080$707$1,783$800$700-60%13%14%
GeForce RTX 3070 Ti$587$1,244$698$600-53%19%16%
GeForce RTX 3070$495$1,179$580$500-58%17%16%
GeForce RTX 3060 Ti$433$1,007$470$400-57%9%18%
GeForce RTX 3060$365$761$390$330-52%7%18%
GeForce RTX 3050$299$328$25010%31%
Radeon RX 6950 XT$1,125$1,060$1,100-6%-4%
Radeon RX 6900 XT$703$1,527$850$1,000-54%21%-15%
Radeon RX 6800 XT$637$1,387$690$650-54%8%6%
Radeon RX 6800$529$1,282$600$580-59%13%3%
Radeon RX 6750 XT$526$540$5503%-2%
Radeon RX 6700 XT$391$898$450$480-56%15%-6%
Radeon RX 6650 XT$360$380$4006%-5%
Radeon RX 6600 XT$273$659$360$380-59%32%-5%
Radeon RX 6600$252$578$275$330-56%9%-17%
Radeon RX 6500 XT$175$186$2006%-7%
Radeon RX 6400$150$160$1607%0%

Most GPUs are now selling below their official MSRPs, if you're willing to take a chance on eBay. Nvidia's top-tier RTX 3090 Ti, RTX 3090, and RTX 3080 Ti are joined by AMD's RX 6900 XT, RX 6700 XT, RX 6600 XT, and RX 6600 with pricing that's 20%–30% below the MSRP. That's particularly surprising for the RTX 3090 Ti, considering it's only a few months old now and generally cost over $2,000 at launch, but the MSRP was wildly inflated at launch as well. Some people are likely feeling some terrible buyer's remorse.

Nvidia's RTX 3080 — both the 10GB and 12GB models, if we assume a $800 MSRP for the latter (Nvidia never gave an official MSRP for it) — are basically right at MSRP these days, as are the RTX 3070 Ti and RTX 3070. It's only the bottom three RTX 30-series GPUs that still tend to sell for more than the official starting price, with about a 10% markup on the RTX 3060 Ti and RTX 3060, and a 20% markup on the RTX 3050.

AMD's GPUs by comparison are all at or below MSRP if you go through eBay, with the exception of the RX 6950 XT. The number of RX 6950 XT, RX 6750 XT, and RX 6650 XT cards currently sold on eBay remains trivial, however, so don't pay too much attention to those. Also, the retail price on the RX 6950 XT is currently 6% lower than the typical eBay price.

Retail prices in general remain higher than eBay prices, sometimes significantly so. Outside of the RX 6950 XT and RTX 3080 12GB, you can expect to pay on average 13% more to purchase a new card at retail. However, that's skewed somewhat by the RTX 3090 and RX 6600 XT that currently sell for 40% and 32% more at retail right now. AMD has officially discontinued the latter, replacing it with the new RX 6650 XT, while Nvidia has effectively halted production on the RTX 3090 and replaced it with the 3090 Ti.

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Nvidia Ampere and AMD RDNA2 GPUs: eBay Pricing for June 2022
GPUAvg eBay PriceQTY SoldLast PriceMonthly ChangeGross SalesFPS/$
GeForce RTX 3090 Ti$1,538107$1,829-15.9%$164,5990.0861
GeForce RTX 3090$1,098885$1,438-23.7%$971,5880.1153
GeForce RTX 3080 Ti$956499$1,134-15.7%$476,9140.1291
GeForce RTX 3080 12GB$83540$959-13.0%$33,3890.1492
GeForce RTX 3080$7281134$899-19.0%$825,9150.1596
GeForce RTX 3070 Ti$620634$710-12.6%$393,2960.1678
GeForce RTX 3070$5181472$641-19.3%$761,9960.1927
GeForce RTX 3060 Ti$4611324$579-20.4%$610,0460.1986
GeForce RTX 3060$379646$424-10.6%$244,5560.1854
GeForce RTX 3050$304124$315-3.3%$37,7560.1689
Radeon RX 6950 XT$1,06910$1,600-33.2%$10,6930.1284
Radeon RX 6900 XT$767176$875-12.4%$134,9080.1692
Radeon RX 6800 XT$625228$767-18.6%$142,3930.1978
Radeon RX 6800$551148$655-15.9%$81,5470.2010
Radeon RX 6750 XT$5135$5110.3%$2,5650.1973
Radeon RX 6700 XT$407421$477-14.7%$171,3220.2353
Radeon RX 6650 XT$36843$400-8.0%$15,8170.2172
Radeon RX 6600 XT$299417$350-14.6%$124,5700.2613
Radeon RX 6600$258221$290-11.1%$56,9890.2586
Radeon RX 6500 XT$17152$192-11.0%$8,8680.1784
Radeon RX 6400$1533$1511.8%$4600.1543

Focusing just on eBay pricing, nearly every GPU dropped by 10% compared to last month. The RX 6400 and RX 6750 XT are the sole cards that cost incrementally more, though they hardly count considering only three RX 6400 cards were sold on eBay during the month of June, and only five 6750 cards were sold. The 6950 XT had very few sales as well, just ten, though that's better than the two that were sold on eBay in May.

If we omit those three cards, average prices on eBay for the remaining current generation GPUs dropped by 14% compared to last month. Also note that some of the oldest cards, like Nvidia's RTX 3090, 3080, 3070, and 3060 Ti, and AMD's RX 6800 XT and 6800, dropped quite a bit more than cards that haven't been around quite as long. Those six GPUs that all launched in late 2020 dropped by 20% on average. Not coincidentally, those cards are the most likely candidates for having been down in the GPU mines for the past year and a half.

We can also look at the data in a slightly different manner, focusing on the average GPU price for all cards sold on eBay. Doing that, the average price for current generation GPUs fell from $736 in May to just $614 in June, a 17% drop. Separating that into AMD and Nvidia GPUs doesn't really change things, with AMD prices falling 17.5% and Nvidia prices dropping 15.6%.

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Nvidia Turing and AMD RDNA GPUs: eBay Pricing for June 2022
GPUAvg eBay PriceQTY SoldLast PriceMonthly ChangeGross SalesFPS/$
GeForce RTX 2080 Ti$564292$686-17.8%$164,5800.1703
GeForce RTX 2080 Super$407174$498-18.4%$70,7450.2088
GeForce RTX 2080$348157$430-19.0%$54,6770.2360
GeForce RTX 2070 Super$342305$409-16.4%$104,1700.2238
GeForce RTX 2070$310157$365-15.0%$48,6810.2190
GeForce RTX 2060 Super$298153$370-19.4%$45,6230.2182
GeForce RTX 2060$241328$282-14.6%$78,8940.2295
GeForce GTX 1660 Ti$200193$252-20.5%$38,6790.2190
GeForce GTX 1660 Super$201506$249-19.3%$101,6200.2212
GeForce GTX 1660$17476$214-19.1%$13,1880.2298
GeForce GTX 1650 Super$17182$183-6.4%$14,0510.1938
GeForce GTX 1650$155316$175-11.1%$49,0530.1714
Radeon RX 5700 XT$314725$449-30.1%$227,8390.2345
Radeon RX 5700$286133$381-25.1%$37,9860.2270
Radeon RX 5600 XT$21574$294-27.0%$15,8910.2705
Radeon RX 5500 XT 8GB$17431$216-19.4%$5,4070.2284
Radeon RX 5500 XT 4GB$15622$160-2.3%$3,4410.2140

Moving to the previous generation Turing and RDNA1 GPUs, the rate of decline is even higher at 18% month over month. Average sold GPU prices for these cards that are mostly two to four years old went from $361 in May to just $289 in June. AMD's average GPU price this time fell quite a bit more, 27% compared to 17% for Nvidia, with the average RX 5700 XT price falling by 30%.

Total card sales for both previous- and current-generation GPUs were down compared to May, which isn't particularly surprising, as the lower prices mean there's less enticement for people to try to offload older hardware. That doesn't mean there aren't a lot of old graphics cards waiting to be sold, though.

Get Ready for a Flood of Used Cards

Used graphics cards are like used cars

Buying a used graphics card can feel a lot like buying a used car. Shop carefully. (Image credit: Shutterstock)

We recently looked at potential gains or losses for GPU miners over the past two years. Separate from that data, there's an interesting piece of information if we look at Ethereum's network hashrate. It increased from 228.2 TH/s in September 2020 to 1126.7 TH/s on May 13, 2022. That's an 898.5 TH/s increase, which represents a frankly astounding number of graphics cards.

I calculated the ratio of RTX 30-series GPUs sold on eBay over the past year, for current-gen cards, and found that the average hashrate for Ethereum mining (not factoring in Nvidia's LHR models) was 69 MH/s. That's certainly higher than the average hashrate for GPUs used in mining during the past 18 months, and it would still require 13 million GPUs to reach that figure.

Perhaps there were a bunch of Ethereum ASICs contributing as well, and there were definitely a lot of older GPUs used for mining in the past couple of years. Add in all the Turing, Pascal, RDNA2, RDNA1, Vega, and Polaris cards and we're potentially looking at tens of millions of graphics cards that were primarily mining Ethereum.

Now imagine what will happen if/when Ethereum finally transitions to Proof of Stake with "The Merge," ostensibly before the end of the year. Noah (ie, AMD and Nvidia) might need to build another ark to survive the coming flood.

Gamers sitting on older hardware meanwhile may finally have some great budget-friendly upgrades to consider — check our GPU benchmarks hierarchy to see how the past several generations of GPUs match up. Not that buying a used graphics card doesn't bring with it potential concerns, but the RTX 2070 and 2060 Super sit alongside AMD's RX 5700 XT and 5700 all around the $300 mark. Those could easily fall to $200 or less in the coming months, and all of those would deliver substantially more performance than a midrange Pascal or Polaris GPU from 2016–2017. Just be wary of shady used card dealers.

Jarred Walton

Jarred Walton is a senior editor at Tom's Hardware focusing on everything GPU. He has been working as a tech journalist since 2004, writing for AnandTech, Maximum PC, and PC Gamer. From the first S3 Virge '3D decelerators' to today's GPUs, Jarred keeps up with all the latest graphics trends and is the one to ask about game performance.

  • Alvar "Miles" Udell
    Wonder how many people are like me and wishing they sold their Turing GPU a few months ago for more than they paid for it new before the "shortage"...
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Wonder how many people are like me and wishing they sold their Turing GPU a few months ago for more than they paid for it new before the "shortage"...
    Doesn't have to be a Turing. A year ago, I may have been able to sell my GTX1050 for ~$300, now I might be able to get an RX6600 for that sort of money.
    Reply
  • LastStanding
    This is just the beginning. Everyone knows that these overvalued companies will fall hard but it would be even worst this time due to... themselves.

    About time and more fright to come! 🔫
    Reply
  • MrStillwater
    Admin said:
    Graphics card prices and availability continue to improve, and the used market is being flooded with old mining cards, now that GPU mining is borderline unprofitable. Here's a look at the current prices, for new cards at retail as well as used GPUs on eBay.

    Graphics Card Prices Slid Another 14% in June, Down 57% Since January : Read more
    And yet another article about how much prices have come down whilst here in the UK they've barely moved in the past couple of months.
    Reply
  • JarredWaltonGPU
    MrStillwater said:
    And yet another article about how much prices have come down whilst here in the UK they've barely moved in the past couple of months.
    Yeah, I haven't even tried to track pricing across other locations. We're predominantly a US website (about 45% of all users), and while the UK is our second largest traffic source, it's only around 6–7% of the traffic.

    I suspect crypto mining was never that big in the UK either, since electricity prices are a lot higher and would drastically cut into the profitability. I don't think your GPU prices ever got quite as high as in the US, and thus they didn't have quite as far to fall. More importantly, if there weren't a lot of miners in the UK, then there aren't going to be many used GPUs from miners flooding secondhand markets, which in turn also impacts how much prices have to drop.

    A quick look at Scan suggests UK retail prices are pretty much comparable to current US prices. Basically, you pay about as much in GBP as we pay in USD, which means you pay more but that's pretty much always been the case.

    RX 6950 XT: £1105
    RX 6900 XT: £930
    RX 6800 XT: £800
    RX 6800: £590
    RX 6750 XT: £560
    RX 6700 XT: £500
    RX 6650 XT: £395
    RX 6600 XT: £400
    RX 6600: £320

    RTX 3090 Ti: £1799
    RTX 3090: £1599
    RTX 3080 Ti: £1080
    RTX 3080 12GB: £875
    RTX 3080: £770
    RTX 3070 Ti: £690
    RTX 3070: £559
    RTX 3060 Ti: £470
    RTX 3060: £380
    RTX 3050: £287
    Reply
  • I checked local eBuy counterpart in Poland and 1050Ti price is higher than in retail. Used GPU's are overpriced. I wouldn't pay anything higher than 50% MSRP for a used card (used for a year) and less for anything older. You never know what you buy and warranty might not apply when the card breaks.
    Reply
  • JarredWaltonGPU
    Tom Sunday said:
    Talked with friends at the local computer show. This is where 'the man on the street' shops and communicates. No marketing agendas but the real truth. From what I gather most all purchases on ebay confirmed that reseller’s pass-off used (so called refurbished) GPU’s as new. Besides the passing-on of former ‘Miner Cards’ in many other unscrupulous ways. So the word was to never use ebay as once the seller has your money its goodbye and no looking back! My own opinion in this matter is that ebay is just one step above Craiglist and where most expect bargain basement prices but full well knowing that not all things are what they seem to be!
    This is bunk. eBay is heavily weighted toward buyers these days. If you buy something, even if it states, "No returns," you can file a complaint with eBay if the item doesn't work or is not what you wanted. Not only that, but most people offer 30 day return policies (the default for eBay), so someone could buy a card, use it for 25 days, and then say they want a refund. Thankfully, most buyers aren't that bad, and frankly if you get a "refurbished" card that's sold as new, at a decent price, you should have already guessed that it wasn't brand new. Beyond that, if it's fully refurbished with replaced thermal pads on the GDDR6X memory (for higher end RTX 30-series cards like 3070 Ti and above), you'll probably end up enjoying the card more.

    I've replaced the thermal pads on a few GPUs recently, as a test. It doesn't matter the brand or model, if you have a 3080 that was running the memory at 100C or higher, you can usually drop that to 80C with good thermal pads. And if your GPU is clean and running cool and performs as expected, it will probably continue to do so for some time. If it has issues right when you get it, you file a complaint with eBay and get a refund.
    Reply
  • MrStillwater
    JarredWaltonGPU said:
    Yeah, I haven't even tried to track pricing across other locations. We're predominantly a US website (about 45% of all users), and while the UK is our second largest traffic source, it's only around 6–7% of the traffic.

    I suspect crypto mining was never that big in the UK either, since electricity prices are a lot higher and would drastically cut into the profitability. I don't think your GPU prices ever got quite as high as in the US, and thus they didn't have quite as far to fall. More importantly, if there weren't a lot of miners in the UK, then there aren't going to be many used GPUs from miners flooding secondhand markets, which in turn also impacts how much prices have to drop.

    Thanks for the reply Jarred, I appreciate you can't benchmark for every country in the world and wasn't expecting you too. You're right that crypto probably isn't huge here in the UK, but I'm not sure you're right about prices never having gotten as high as the US - it would be interesting to see some actual stats. In the first half of last year there was absolutely zero stock available in the UK, and it was only around May that even small numbers of cards started to become available. We've never had cards being sold here at MSRP and even now most are well above (certainly in the mid-range tiers). I bought my RX6800 a year ago and it cost £950, which was the cheapest I could find it for. Up until today the cheapest I'd seen them going for was still over £600. I see there are now some listed at £589 so they have dropped a little in the last few days, although MSRP was £529 when they were first announced so they're still above. Ultimately I was just lamenting as I see articles on various websites almost every day saying cards are dropping in price but they've remained pretty stable here for the past two months. I'm happy to see there's been some movement on them again, even if slight.
    Reply
  • Ogotai
    i took a screenshot of 3 cards i am looking at getting, none of them have changed in price, at all. that screen shot was from almost 2 months ago
    Reply
  • JarredWaltonGPU
    Ogotai said:
    i took a screenshot of 3 cards i am looking at getting, none of them have changed in price, at all. that screen shot was from almost 2 months ago
    I can believe that. Often individual models won't change as quickly in price, especially if the retailer paid a supplier $700 as an example and wants to make 14% profit by selling the card for $800. But if a new model with similar performance comes along and only costs $600 from the supplier, then the retailer can sell it for $700 and make 17% profit.
    Reply