This is the final edition of our GPU pricing update series for 2021.

It’s been
an unbelievable rough year for anyone looking to upgrade their graphics
card or build a new PC for gaming, with inflated pricing seen all year long
(and several months at the end of 2020 as well). For many people, this new
generation of GPUs has been a bit of a write off, despite the actual
hardware being quite good, which makes it doubly disappointing.
Our mission to track GPU pricing trends and look at the current market will
continue in 2022, but for now let’s see what’s been happening in the
closing weeks of 2021, which is typically quite busy because of the
holidays. As we said last month, the expectation is that prices wouldn’t see
any major reductions as demand for components would be reasonably high
during this period.
Refreshed GPUs
We also had a strange GPU launch in December. The GeForce RTX 2060
12GB, which was simply pushed out to the market without much fanfare
from Nvidia. No review sample program, which is usually the case with
these sorts of launches and why we haven’t taken a look at it yet, but also
apparently there's not that much stock.
The RTX 2060 12GB was supposed to launch on early December, but
even today if we look at various retailers, the card is basically nowhere to
be seen. There’s not a listing for the GPU on Newegg, despite plenty of
listings for the regular 6GB variant. In Australia, PC Case Gear and several
other retailers don’t have any, and only a single model was seen at one
retailer, a Zotac model available at Scorptec. It’s priced at $1050 AUD,
which is $250 more than 6GB models selling at the same retailer. Other
regions are facing the same situation, where there's no stock or very little of
it, but with that kind of pricing, it surely won't be drawing in buyers since it’s
as expensive as some RTX 3060 boards.
Speaking to some of our industry contacts, the RTX 2060 12GB had a
loose early December to January release schedule. The earlier date was
more of a statement that “hey, you might see some 2060 12GB models on
shelves, a few OEMs have a small batch of them ready, so just know they
aren’t fake models.” As opposed to a key product launch, that seems more
widespread availability even if it sells out immediately on day one.
The information we received also paints a picture of a GPU that gamers
probably won’t want to buy. One industry contact described the RTX 2060
12GB as a “card for mining,” in that its price tag, game performance, mining
performance and memory capacity makes more sense for miners than it
does for gamers. It’s been hard to pinpoint an MSRP as Nvidia hasn't
disclosed one, but what we’ve seen from current listings is a GPU that gets
pretty close to the RTX 3060 despite almost certainly performing well below
it. For reference, our data has the RTX 2060 Super about 14% slower than
the RTX 3060 on average.
There are more Nvidia GPU refreshes on the way as well, with current
rumors suggesting an RTX 3070 Ti refresh with 16GB of memory, and an
RTX 3080 refresh with 12GB of memory. We’d expect to see those newer
cards around mid to late January at the earliest. After that we’re also
expecting the RTX 3090 Ti and the long awaited release of the RTX
3050 series for desktops, which have also been rumored for a while now.
That’d be four refreshed Nvidia GPUs in the first few months of 2022, which
does not automatically translate into proper availability in any way
unfortunately.
From the Red Team, we're expecting new budget oriented GPUs using a
new Navi 24 die. Those should arrive in the first few months of 2022 in the
form of something like an “RX 6500 XT.” Alongside the RTX 3050, this
should create a more competitive environment for cheaper GPUs, although
these days a “cheaper” GPU costs like $500, so we’ll have to temper our
expectations a bit. Both cards will probably have a $200 to 300 MSRP, but
actually set you back ~$500 at retail, which sucks but that’s the current
state of things. Intel Arc GPUs aren’t too far away either.
That’s a brief summary of what we're expecting to happen with GPU
launches in the next few months – and maybe we’ll see some
announcements at CES – now let’s take a look at the current GPU market
and whether there’s been any price movement.
The Ethereum Rollercoaster
Cryptocurrency mining continues to be the primary reason for inflated GPU
pricing and strong demand, with clear price fluctuations in GPUs following
trends in coin prices or mining profitability. That’s nothing new, we’ve talked
in depth about this in previous pricing updates, and how supply chain
considerations have become less of a factor over time.
In the last month, the price of Ethereum which is the most popular coin for
mining, has dropped by 10% and has been sliding overall for a month and
a half. During that period, mining difficulty has only increased slightly, and
for the last few weeks has basically plateaued, which indicates GPUs aren’t
being added to the mining pool at as high of a rate as in previous months.
Both of these factors tend to be good news for gamers, and in December
they’ve combined to reduce mining profitability by 10 to 20 percent
depending on the GPU, going on Whattomine’s latest data.
GPU Pricing Update
How has this affected used GPU pricing? It’s rather interesting this month
as it does depend on the products we look at. Nvidia GPU prices haven’t
changed much for about six months; there was a noticeable peak in May
related to a boom in crypto, but since then it’s been relatively flat as popular
coins, mining profitability, and other factors have all fluctuated.
Nvidia GPU Pricing Trend 2021
Average Sale Price of eBay Completed Listings, New Products, 3rd Week of Month

For example, in the last six months the RTX 3070 has peaked at about a
$1,230 new on eBay, and has hit $1,100 at the lowest. The RTX 3060 has
sat between $690 and $750 during that same period, so it’s largely been
consistent. The biggest changes have been seen with the RTX 3090.

  MSRP eBay eBay eBay Current Price

Average Average Average Price Increase
Price Price Price Inflation Nov to
October Novembe December Dec
r

GeForce RTX 3090 $1,50 $2,818 $3,107 $2,882 92% -7%

   MSRP eBay eBay eBay Current Price
Average Average Average Price Increase
Price Price Price Inflation Nov to
October Novembe December Dec
r

GeForce RTX 3080 Ti $1,20 $1,851 $1,916 $1,968 64% 3%

0

GeForce RTX 3080 $700 $1,534 $1,584 $1,693 142% 7%

GeForce RTX 3070 Ti $600 $1,151 $1,227 $1,268 111% 3%

GeForce RTX 3070 $500 $1,121 $1,170 $1,099 120% -6%

GeForce RTX 3060 Ti $400 $860 $946 $965 141% 2%

GeForce RTX 3060 $330 $692 $739 $747 126% 1%

        Average 114% 0%

All in all, most current generation Nvidia GPUs remain over double their
launch MSRP.
On the AMD front, it’s a bit different when looking at their current
generation line-up. While sales volumes are significantly lower for AMD
GPUs on eBay, prices have also been more volatile and more aligned with
fluctuations in the crypto market. Take the 6700 XT for example, AMD’s
competitor to the RTX 3070 and one of the highest volume cards available
from Team Red. In the last six months, its price has sat between $730 and
$980, a much larger range than Nvidia.

AMD GPU Pricing Trend 2021

Average Sale Price of eBay Completed Listings, New Products, 3rd Week of Month

But specifically for December, AMD GPUs have slightly declined in price by
low single digits, for an average decline of 4%, which is not bad for the
holiday period. Nvidia GPUs are still in higher demand than AMD's and with
the holiday rush to buy hardware, that’s expected to some degree as Nvidia
still holds significant gamer market share and mindshare.