NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 8GB with 'efficient' GA107 GPU, 115W TBP

NVIDIA has launched its new entry-level Ampere GPU with two variants, with the GeForce RTX 3050 8GB graphics card arriving soon with a more efficient GPU.

The current GeForce RTX 3050 8GB graphics cards on the market, including the two I've reviewed here on TweakTown with the EVGA and MSI RTX 3050 8GB cards, is the GA106-150 GPU. This is a cut-down version of the full GA106 GPU, with 2560 CUDA cores and 8GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit memory bus.

But the new GeForce RTX 3050 8GB graphics card will feature the GA107 GPU, something that was rumored a few months ago now. But why is NVIDIA pushing out the new GA107-based RTX 3050 8GB? Well, the new GA107 is more energy-efficient with a 115W TBP compared to the 130W TBP on the GA106-based RTX 3050 8GB.

• Read more: MSI GeForce RTX 3050 GAMING X 8G Review
• Read more: EVGA GeForce RTX 3050 XC BLACK Review

The GA107 GPU was made for the mobile market, but in desktop form, it's going to be over 10% more power-efficient than the GA106-based RTX 3050 8GB... that's not bad at all. We should also see a new RTX 3050 with 4GB of GDDR6 (the current RTX 3050 has 8GB, while AMD's entry-level RDNA 2-based Radeon RX 6500 XT has just 4GB GDDR6).