The holidays are here and the market for gaming PC components is flooded with great products from many different manufacturers, raising the hopes of gamers all over the world looking to upgrade their rigs. Unfortunately, practically every new graphics card on the market is sold out or hard to get right now due to incredible demand for high-performance PC parts.
While it may be some time before all of the cards listed here are readily available, most of these items can be picked up for a reasonable price with a bit of luck and searching. It's worth noting that, while all of the products on here are Nvidia or AMD graphics cards, many of them are manufactured and sold by partner brands like Asrock or MSI, which offer different designs and often improve cooling or overclocking performance.
AMD Radeon RX 6800XT
AMD has traditionally produced graphics cards that are oriented at the budget range, with bang-for-buck performance as the goal. This time, however, the flagship cards that AMD has unveiled are neck and neck with the high-performance 30-series cards that Nvidia released earlier in the year. The 6800XT is currently AMD's shot at the Nvidia RTX 3080, and while it lags behind in ray tracing and 4K gaming, its competitive price point makes it worth the cost. With Smart Access Memory, the card also pairs extremely well with AMD's CPUs, which now dominate the competition in performance.
Asrock Radeon 6800 16GB
The AMD Radeon 6800 typically performs between the level of the Nvidia 3060Ti and 3070, putting it firmly in the mid-range at a competitive price point. This is a great card for players who care more about good frame rates and respectable capabilities than ray-tracing and top-end performance. Asrock is known for producing affordable versions of medium-range graphics cards like the 6800, so for mid-range performance, it's best to go for a version that doesn't charge a premium for marginal performance gains from higher clocks and bigger coolers.
EVGA FTW3 3080
Mid-range performance is plenty good enough for most gamers, and it's where most people aim for when building a new PC. However, splurging for the best components on the market has big advantages in performance and also ensures that a new PC will have longer before needing an upgrade. The Nvidia RTX 3080 is the best gaming card available, and the EVGA FTW3 3080 has some of the best overclocking performance of any version of the card. EVGA is also known for great reliability and solid long-term performance in its graphics cards, although they often lack the flashy designs and lighting that other graphic cards use.
Gigabyte Gaming 3070
The aforementioned 6800 is a great mid-range card from AMD, but Nvidia's 3070 offers a noticeable bump up in performance for a slightly higher price. It also has great ray-tracing performance for the money, which is becoming ever more important as it becomes the hottest graphics feature in new blockbuster games. For those looking to buy into the world of practical, useable ray-tracing and DLSS, the 3070 is the best bet, and the Gigabyte Gaming 3070 comes from a reputable brand at a reasonable price.
iGame 3070 Advanced OC-V
iGame may be a relatively unknown name in the world of graphics card manufacturers, but Game Rant's review of the iGame 3070 Advanced OC-V found that it is a quality product on par with more well-known brand names. It is made by Colorful, which typically sells more graphics cards in overseas markets outside of the USA, but it has just as much experience making good cards as any other major brand. Buying an iGame 3070 would be a safe bet on an attractive mid- to high-end card.
MSI Gaming X Trio 3060Ti
The 3060Ti is the latest Nvidia graphics card to experience extreme shortages and rampant scalping, but if it can be found the MSI Gaming X Trio 3060Ti will have stellar cooling and excellent performance on the best bang-for-buck 30-series card in Nvidia's lineup. While some people found it strange for Nvidia to launch and improved version of the 3060 so soon, the performance and price can't be ignored. MSI is known for making high-performance cards, and they can certainly wring the utmost in performance out of the 3060Ti with a massive cooler and high clock speeds.
Nvidia RTX 2080 SUPER or 2070 SUPER- Used/Refurbished
While many of the new cards on the market blow the previous generation out of the water, the top end of Nvidia's old lineup is still very respectable. The 2080 SUPER and 2070 SUPER are both phenomenal cards, performing just below the level of the new 3070 and 3060, respectively. They may be a bit hard to find, but with some searching on the used market, it's possible to pick up a reasonably priced used graphics card from someone who has replaced it with one of the new line of products. Graphics cards don't typically lose performance even after years of heavy use, so the only thing to look out for is a damaged unit.