Jacob Fox, hardware writer
(Image credit: Future)
This week I’ve been: Testing a new mouse that I am enjoying greatly but cannot yet speak about 🤐
Welcome to your daily dose of doomcore, and no, I don’t mean that peculiar genre of music. I mean the state of the PC gaming market. Not to be too much of a negative Nelly but things are not looking great out there.
You probably didn’t need me to tell you that, but given I’ve been keeping my eye on the best deals for gaming PCs every week (minus holidays) for the past couple of years, I thought I’d share with you some more specific, cheerfully glum context. You’re welcome.
Let’s take a nice trip down memory lane to check out a couple of the deals I spotted for gaming PCs around this time last year.
Here we are: In an assortment I highlighted last September, an RTX 5060 Ti rig for just $1,000. Today, the cheapest we see any just-about-decent RTX 5060 Ti gaming PC retailing for, is about $1,200—this AVGPC Max for $1,209 at Newegg, for instance.
But that’s not even half of it, because you’ll notice the RAM in that $1,200 rig is DDR4, not DDR5. And if it wasn’t DDR4, you could almost certainly expect such an RTX 5060 Ti rig to have just a single 16 GB stick of DDR5 in single-channel mode.
How about at the higher end? Well, there’s this RTX 5070 Ti gaming PC I also highlighted last September. That was $1,900 for the whole package: RTX 5070 Ti, Ryzen 7 7800X3D, 32 GB of DDR5 RAM, and even a full 2 TB of storage. Y’know, back when we could recommend 2 TB of storage as a baseline for mid-range and higher rigs, while keeping a straight face.
An RTX 5070 Ti gaming PC listed for a pre-memory shortage price on Best Buy last October. (Image credit: iBuyPower, Best Buy, Internet Archive)
And now? I think you know the deal. I actually struggle to find RTX 5070 Ti gaming PCs worth highlighting anymore—the GPU seems to be more lightly stocked than others. Currently, I’ve got a PC with the same base specs listed (on sale!) on our deals hub for $2,400 at Newegg. If you’re okay opting for an RX 9070 XT instead, you can lower that to $2,099 at Walmart, which does net you a more recent X3D chip—our favourite, in fact—but you’re also sacrificing 1 TB of storage.
More generally, I can tell you that after looking at gaming PC deals week-in, week-out for the past couple of years, pretty much every last bastion of hope for reasonable prices has now slipped away.
An RTX 5070 Ti gaming PC on sale at Newegg today for a high, post-memory shortage price. (Image credit: Skytech, Newegg)
For quite a while and even until very recently, RX 9070 XT PCs held on to lower price tags while Nvidia PCs slipped out of stock, presumably because pre-shortage stocks were lasting longer as fewer AMD PCs tend to be scooped up by PC gamers than Nvidia ones. But recently I’ve noticed even the best deals on those seem to have slipped away. On the rare occasion there is one for a decent sub-$2,000 price, you’re very lucky if it has more than 16 GB of RAM and 1 TB of storage.
The lower end of the market is particularly dire. Before the memory crisis, there was quite an abundance of RTX 5060 gaming PCs going on sale for under $1,000, sometimes actually for well under this. This one I highlighted last October, for instance, cost just $749. It seemed to come with just a single 16 GB stick of DDR5 memory, but these days you’re looking at almost $1,000 for the same thing, and that’s if you’re lucky (even deals like that are getting quite rare).
Lowest price per GPU
We’ve been measuring the lowest available price of each current-gen GPU since August 14, 2025.
Lowest pricing (Price, $)
050010001500200020 Week40 Week050010001500200020 Week40 Week
Week
Nvidia RTX 5080Nvidia RTX 5070 TiNvidia RTX 5070Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti 16 GBNvidia RTX 5060 Ti 8 GBNvidia RTX 5060Nvidia RTX 5050AMD RX 9070 XTAMD RX 9070AMD Radeon RX 9070 GREAMD RX 9060 XT 16 GBAMD RX 9060 XT 8 GBIntel Arc B580Intel Arc B570
Lowest pricing Data
Timestamp (Week)
Nvidia RTX 5080 (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5070 Ti (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5070 (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti 16 GB (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti 8 GB (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5060 (Price, $)
Nvidia RTX 5050 (Price, $)
AMD RX 9070 XT (Price, $)
AMD RX 9070 (Price, $)
AMD Radeon RX 9070 GRE (Price, $)
AMD RX 9060 XT 16 GB (Price, $)
AMD RX 9060 XT 8 GB (Price, $)
Intel Arc B580 (Price, $)
Intel Arc B570 (Price, $)
1
1100
780
550
430
368
300
250
700
600
N/A
370
280
260
230
2
1099
750
550
430
340
300
250
700
600
N/A
370
270
260
230
3
1000
750
524
430
370
291
250
700
550
N/A
370
280
250
230
4
1000
750
546
430
345
296
250
695
550
N/A
370
280
250
230
5
1000
749
481
430
340
300
250
670
600
N/A
350
270
250
230
6
929
749
499
379
340
289
240
670
600
N/A
350
270
250
230
7
999
750
520
430
350
299
240
650
550
N/A
350
270
250
230
8
980
749
500
430
342
299
250
650
550
N/A
350
270
250
200
9
999
750
500
430
323
299
250
650
560
N/A
350
270
250
220
10
989
730
480
430
340
299
250
600
550
N/A
360
270
250
210
11
990
699
489
400
320
280
230
600
550
N/A
340
250
250
200
12
989
730
500
400
320
279
220
600
530
N/A
350
275
250
200
13
1000
750
527
420
342
279
220
600
530
N/A
350
280
250
200
14
1000
750
540
420
313
279
220
600
530
N/A
370
280
250
202
15
1000
749
499
430
350
279
200
600
530
N/A
380
288
240
202
16
1100
750
499
430
350
270
200
620
530
N/A
380
288
240
202
17
1230
750
549
430
330
260
235
660
580
N/A
390
310
250
200
18
1268
829
540
450
330
290
240
700
580
N/A
390
310
250
200
19
1380
899
549
450
330
299
240
720
580
N/A
400
310
260
200
20
1350
1000
620
520
330
299
240
720
600
N/A
440
310
290
200
21
1365
950
620
520
351
299
260
730
590
N/A
440
350
290
250
22
1365
950
620
520
360
299
260
730
630
N/A
400
346
300
250
23
1290
950
630
520
360
340
260
730
630
N/A
440
346
300
250
24
1290
950
625
520
360
340
260
730
620
N/A
440
346
300
250
25
1250
950
630
550
360
349
260
730
610
N/A
440
346
300
250
26
1260
950
604
550
360
349
290
730
610
N/A
440
340
300
250
27
1290
950
640
570
360
349
290
730
630
N/A
440
340
300
250
28
1250
900
630
515
390
349
290
720
620
N/A
440
346
290
250
29
1290
990
636
500
390
349
290
710
620
N/A
449
350
290
250
30
1290
990
630
500
390
330
290
710
620
N/A
440
350
290
260
31
1290
990
599
500
380
330
290
670
620
N/A
440
350
290
260
32
1290
990
599
515
380
310
290
710
620
N/A
430
360
290
260
33
1290
980
599
490
400
349
290
710
600
N/A
430
360
290
260
34
1270
980
599
550
380
349
290
710
620
N/A
440
360
290
260
35
1290
900
599
550
380
350
290
700
600
N/A
430
360
304
260
36
1250
980
599
550
370
340
290
700
600
550
440
360
300
260
37
1250
980
599
570
370
340
290
700
600
550
440
350
304
250
38
1250
980
599
570
370
340
290
700
600
550
440
350
304
250
39
1250
920
599
570
330
340
290
700
600
500
400
360
298
250
40
1250
955
599
565
330
340
290
700
600
500
430
360
291
260
41
1250
900
560
560
330
339
290
700
600
500
430
360
290
250
42
1250
950
550
570
380
350
290
690
635
550
450
360
290
260
43
1290
1030
755
650
420
359
299
720
650
500
470
370
310
260
44
1479
1088
763
780
420
N/A
299
720
650
500
470
400
310
260
45
1550
1150
800
773
389
359
299
730
630
530
460
360
310
260
There is no area of the gaming PC market that isn’t now feeling the impact of the global memory shortage. That much I am now certain of. Pre-shortage stocks seem to have run thoroughly dry and system builders and manufacturers are having to up their prices to keep up with ever-increasing memory and storage costs. Not to mention climbing GPU costs (which do themselves, after all, contain memory).
The thing is, people are still going to want to buy gaming PCs. Which means that apart from the most budget-constrained people who will be priced out of the market completely, prospective PC gamers are unfortunately going to have to start adjusting their pricing expectations.
I often witness the sentiment that gaming PC deals these days—say, $1,500 for a decent RTX 5070 gaming PC, or $1,200 for a decent RTX 5060 Ti one—are not good ones. And obviously this is true considering the historical market. But those are unfortunately ‘good’ deals given the market today. It sucks, but it is the reality of the market right now.
And there doesn’t seem to be a lick of difference we can make, at least not while the AI boom rages on and continues to hoard computing silicon in its servers. Happy 2026, everyone.
