Why You Still Can't Buy a Graphics Card at a Normal Price
AMD and Nvidia GPUs are still selling 70%+ above MSRP, and a new TSMC price hike means relief isn't coming soon.
I checked street prices again this morning out of habit more than hope, and nothing has changed: AMD Radeon cards are going for roughly 74% over MSRP, Nvidia GeForce cards around 70% over. If you wanted a new GPU at the price printed on the box, you’re basically out of luck, and have been for the better part of a year now.
The usual suspects are still to blame, just in a slightly different mix than last spring. Chip shortages haven’t eased — foundries are still running flat out and can’t expand capacity fast enough to meet demand across every category of chip, not just GPUs. Layered on top of that is a second wave of mining demand, this time not just from crypto but from the NFT boom pulling in buyers who want GPU horsepower for entirely different reasons than gaming. Two overlapping bubbles competing for the same limited silicon.
Now there’s a new wrinkle making things worse: TSMC reportedly pushed through a price hike of nearly 20% for some customers. TSMC fabricates chips for both AMD and Nvidia (among basically everyone else in the industry), so that cost doesn’t just evaporate — it gets passed down the chain, and eventually lands on whoever’s trying to buy a card at Micro Center or Best Buy.
What AMD is saying
AMD has said publicly that it plans to prioritize supply of its high-end GPUs over the coming months, which sounds like good news on paper. Read it as an admission that current allocation is skewed toward lower and mid-range parts, or toward laptop and console chips where margins and contractual obligations matter more to the company’s bottom line. Prioritizing the top end doesn’t necessarily mean more total silicon — it can just mean shuffling what’s already scarce. And critically, AMD itself expects the tightness to persist into next year. That’s not a company hinting at a quick fix.
If you’re building a PC right now, my honest advice hasn’t changed in months: buy what you can find in stock at anything close to MSRP and don’t wait for a “normal” market to return, because there’s no clear signal for when that happens. Secondhand cards carry real risk if they were run hard for mining, so if you go that route, ask sellers directly about usage history and be skeptical of vague answers. Prebuilt systems from major OEMs are sometimes a smarter path than a DIY build right now, since manufacturers with existing supply contracts can occasionally get you a GPU-equipped machine for less hassle than sourcing the card yourself.
None of this is unique to gaming hardware — it’s the same underlying story playing out across consumer electronics this year, from game consoles to cars waiting on chips they can’t get. But GPUs feel especially painful because the premium is so visible: you can pull up a listing right now and see exactly how much extra you’re being asked to pay for the exact same silicon that should’ve shipped at MSRP. Until fab capacity catches up or mining demand cools off on its own, that gap isn’t closing.