The highly anticipated Nvidia RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 graphics cards are set to launch on January 30th, but concerns about limited availability are already circulating. Reports from retailers and manufacturers suggest significant shortages are likely, with some even reporting receiving only a handful of units. This scarcity is fueled by the upcoming Lunar New Year, impacting initial shipments. Manufacturer MSI, for example, cited the holiday as a contributing factor to the initial supply constraints, expecting stock to improve in February.

Several retailers have echoed these concerns, with Overclockers UK reporting extremely limited RTX 5090 stock ("single digits") and only a few hundred RTX 5080 units for launch. PowerGPU in the US similarly predicted extremely low availability for the RTX 5090 launch.

In response to the growing anxiety, Nvidia representative Tim@Nvidia issued a statement acknowledging the anticipated high demand and the possibility of stock-outs. The company assures consumers that they and their partners are working to increase retail shipments daily.

Despite Nvidia's statement, the fear of limited stock has already attracted scalpers. Pre-sale listings on eBay are already showing inflated prices, with one Asus ROG Astral RTX 5090 listed for a staggering $5,750—a significant markup of 187% over its $1,999 MSRP.

Adding another layer of complexity, Nvidia's share price experienced a significant drop (16.86%) on Monday following the announcement of the Chinese AI model DeepSeek. This development, with its significantly lower training cost compared to Nvidia's solutions, poses a potential threat to Nvidia's datacenter GPU sales, potentially further impacting the allocation of resources for consumer GPU production.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 – Photos

5 Images