With Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales season finally over and winter Holidays right around the corner, you might think gamers are spending top-dollar on upgrading their setups with better GPUs. After all, that has always been the trend, but things are looking differently this year, as GPU sales are down by 8% in Q3 2024 compared to last year.
To be fair, if any of my friends came to me asking for a graphics card recommendation these days, I would also suggest holding off the purchase, after all, the current graphics cards are at the end of their lifecycle, so it is really not a good idea to spend such a big amount of money on a GPU that’ll be considered last-gen in a month or two.
NVIDIA’s Next-Gen Flagships Are Not Too Far
CES 2025 is set to take off on 7th January, so it is less than a month away, and this time, it is very likely that both NVIDIA and AMD will announce their next-gen graphics card. In fact, NVIDIA’s CEO, Jensen Huang, will deliver a keynote at CES 2025, which makes the possibility of an RTX 50-series announcement very real.
It appears NVIDIA will seemingly start from the RTX 5090 announcement and may also show us its RTX 5080 and 5070. Based on previous years, these cards will likely be released by the end of February. After that, we can expect more info on the RTX 5070 and similar cards, like the RTX 5060, down the lane. This means that the first couple of months of 2025 are going to be all about the colossally large flagship RTX 50 series GPUs, their performance jumps, and of course, the power requirements.
As such, if you’ve been eyeing a 4K graphics card, like the RTX 4080 Super or the RTX 4090, I would highly recommend waiting for just a few more months. If all goes well with shipments and there are no scalping problems, as we saw after the release of RTX 4090, there is no reason not to go for these cards.
AMD Also Expected To Announce RDNA 4 At CES 2025
AMD has been rumored for months to be preparing the launch of its next-gen RDNA 4 GPUs, with announcements expected in early 2025. Reports suggest the Navi 48 GPUs could debut at CES, followed by the Navi 44 GPUs in Q2. It seems AMD will focus on mid-range cards like with the RX 80-series, likely stepping away from high-end models. This shift makes sense, as the RX 7800 XT has proven to be a strong option for 1440p gaming, while the flagship RX 7900 XTX just couldn’t find its position.
With that said, if you’re looking for a 1440p or even a 4K gaming card with upscaling, it might be worth waiting for AMD’s RDNA 4 GPUs. Right now, you’ve got options like NVIDIA’s SUPER cards—such as the 4070 (or Ti) SUPER—or AMD’s RX 7800 XT and RX 7900 XT. However, if AMD gets the RX 80-series right, it could easily secure a top spot among the best graphics cards for 1440p gaming.
Intel Is Also Gearing Up For Budget Gaming
Earlier this month, Intel announced its upcoming Battlemage graphics cards, the Arc B570 and B580. The B580 should be hitting the shelves in a couple of days, with the B570 set to arrive in mid-January. While we are yet to review them, their on-paper specifications, Intel’s test results, and leaked benchmarks appear to be very promising.
Since the B580 is right around the corner, most of the spotlight is on it, and the card offers 12 GB of GDDR6 VRAM at a $219 MSRP, completely undercutting both AMD’s RX 7600 and NVIDIA’s RTX 4060.
Intel is positioning the B580 as a budget-friendly 1440p card, which also makes it a solid choice for competitive 1080p gaming. If you’re looking for an affordable low-end graphics card that handles 1080p with ease and can even tackle 1440p, it might be worth waiting to see how the B580 performs in reviews.
Getting Into The Numbers
All of this points to one thing: whether you’re after a 4K flagship card, a mid-range 1440p option, or even an affordable 1080p GPU, there are big releases lined up from all three GPU manufacturers in the next couple of months, making it a very bad time to go GPU-shopping at the moment.
People realize this, and that’s why there has been a significant decline in overall GPU sales in Q4 2024. The numbers paint a pretty clear picture—GPU sales have taken a big hit this year. As per data from Jon Peddie Research, in Q3 2024, shipments were down 7.9% compared to the same time last year. It gets worse when you look at the previous quarter, with sales dropping a steep 14.5%. That’s a huge dip, especially during a time of year when people usually upgrade their PCs before the holidays
AMD Must Get Aggressive For Survival
Apart from the overall decline in GPU sales, things are looking extra bad for Team Red. Once a strong player in the GPU market, AMD is now down to just 10% market share—a record low. After years of losing ground to NVIDIA, AMD needs a big win, and its upcoming RDNA 4 GPUs could be the company’s best shot at making a comeback.
The pressure is on. If AMD doesn’t get this launch right, it could fall even further behind and risk becoming irrelevant in the GPU world. That’s bad news for everyone because less competition means fewer choices and higher prices for gamers. To stay in the game, AMD has to step up and deliver something impressive.
All things considered, whether AMD matches Intel’s strategy in pricing its low-end graphics card or not is something that remains to be seen, but as of now, this is certainly not a great time to shop for a new graphics card.
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Moiz Banoori, with a decade of experience in gaming and tech journalism and a degree in journalism, is a notable figure in the industry. He has contributed to various esteemed platforms, showcasing his expertise in both reporting and opinion writing.
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