NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050
Side-by-side benchmark comparison, specs, pricing, and value analysis.
Benchmark Comparison
Gaming figures are average frames per second, measured by Tom's Hardware GPU hierarchy. Geometric mean of 15 games, ultra settings, no upscaling. Ray tracing figures are DXR-enabled at 1440p. A dash means the card was not tested at that resolution. Productivity and Steel Nomad are synthetic scores on their own scales and are not comparable to the fps columns.
Specifications
| Spec | GeForce RTX 3070 | GeForce RTX 5050 |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 8GB GDDR6 | 8GB GDDR6 |
| Memory Bandwidth | 448 GB/s | 320 GB/s |
| Shaders | 5888 | 2560 |
| Boost Clock | 1725 MHz | 2572 MHz |
| TDP | 220W | 130W |
| Architecture | Ampere | Blackwell 2.0 |
| 3DMark Steel Nomad | 3,168 | 2,317 |
| Best Price | $499 | $249 |
| Value Score | 39/100 | 76/100 |
Verdict
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 is faster but costs more. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 offers better value for money. Your choice depends on budget vs. performance priority.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050: Which Should You Buy?
This is not a close race. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 delivers 77.7 fps at 1440p ultra to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050's 57.1 fps, a 36% gap. Only pick the slower card if it is dramatically cheaper or you need it for a lower resolution.
You pay a 100% premium for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 ($499 against $249) to get 36% more frames. The extra frames do not keep up with the extra cost — the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 is the better value here.
Two things beyond raw speed: the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 draws 90W less (130W versus 220W), which can mean a smaller PSU and a quieter case; and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 is 5 years newer (2025 versus 2020), so it gets longer driver support and newer upscaling and frame generation features.