Gamers rejoice: the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 looks bad for cryptomining

(Image credit: Nvidia)

Update: PC gamers, now is not the time to buy a new graphics card.

Given the current state of the GPU market, where even ageing cards are selling for several times their MSRP and store stock evaporates as soon as it appears, you’d be forgiven for thinking a new card will be equally scarce.

Assuming the RTX 3050 goes on sale at $250 (not unlikely given RTX 3060 stock theoretically costs $329), the site calculates that with the current value of Etherium, the card would take 500 days — or around a year and four months — to recoup the cost involved. And if the current bout of GPU inflation were to up the price to $350, that would increase to 700 days (or a month shy of two years).

For people who just want a graphics card to game with, that’s excellent news. And as Videocardz points out, the weak performance isn’t the only thing that would make the RTX 3050 a poor investment for crypto miners.

With Etherum’s switch to proof-of-stake mining — which aims to make GPU mining redundant and hopefully see a flurry of pre-owned cards hit the market — scheduled for June 2022, it simply won’t be worth a miner buying a RTX 3050 if this Ethereum mining performance is matched in the real world, even if it were released tomorrow.

Freelance contributor Alan has been writing about tech for over a decade, covering phones, drones and everything in between. Previously Deputy Editor of tech site Alphr, his words are found all over the web and in the occasional magazine too. When not weighing up the pros and cons of the latest smartwatch, you'll probably find him tackling his ever-growing games backlog. He also handles all the Wordle coverage on Tom's Guide and has been playing the addictive NYT game for the last several years in an effort to keep his streak forever intact.