What is currently the best graphics card on the market?

When it comes to consumer graphics cards, this is the RTX 4090, but the RTX 5090 will not be able to wait long.

The exact manufacturer makes another small difference. Although all 4090 cards have the same chip from Nvidia, the cooler differs and in some cases also the exact settings depending on the manufacturer. Some models offer a slightly higher clock or higher power budgets and better overclocking playroom. Without manual overclocking, we are talking about performance differences in the single-digit percentage range.

The cooler is not important either. Not only can a bad cooler become very loud, he can even harm the performance. Because if the GPU chip becomes too hot, the overheating protection and the GPU reduces the cycle. The 4090 has an absurdly high waste heat, here a good cooler is enormously important. With such a card it must also be ensured that the PC housing offers enough fresh air and the warm exhaust air can be removed as soon as possible, otherwise a card can quickly heat up the entire housing – and thus also itself.

As a marginal note: There are also “professional graphics cards” that are not intended for games, but sometimes have an even higher theoretical computing power or more graphics memory. These maps are not necessarily better in games, but also offer some better performance in professional applications, which can also be things like scientific simulations and AI. In addition, such cards can usually also be coupled and operated in combination, if you simply need an enormous amount of computing power. With “Grafik”, this often has nothing to do anymore.