Graphics card vendors have started to show off their RTX 5050 models and they’re looking ridiculously huge for such a tiny GPU

I know I have the appearance of a grumpy old soul, and given half the chance, I’ll whine about GPUs until the end of the universe pops up to say hello, but I honestly do like low-end, cheap graphics cards. Especially small ones that can fit into a compact case or just use a basic cooler, because that’s all it needs. But looking at some of the new GeForce RTX 5050 cards, I’m surprised by just how ridiculously big some of them are.

Starting with Asus, for no reason other than writing this out alphabetically, Hardware Luxx’s Andreas Schilling posted some preview images of incoming RTX 5050 cards on X. The first set of pictures shows exactly what you’d expect for a card that uses 130 W of power: two fans in a two-slot design.

But then you have the second lot of pictures, and it’s an Asus Prime model with three fans. I get that Asus will want to save on production costs by using another model’s cooler, but it’s just plain silly. The RTX 5050 absolutely won’t need that much cooling, and while one might argue that it should be quieter than an average dual-fan one, it’s still excessive.

Head over to Colorful’s website and you’ll be greeted by its new iGame GeForce RTX 5050 Ultra W OC card. Yep, it’s another one with three fans (so is the Tomahawk model) and it boasts a length of 300.5 mm or 11.83 inches. Most graphics cards that have a power limit of 130 W are typically no more than 9.5 inches in length.

And never want to miss out on making a GPU all big and in-your-face, Gigabyte has the RTX 5050 Gaming OC, which comes in a more sensible 280 mm (11 inches), but that’s still unnecessarily big. Gigabyte and Colorful do have smaller RTX 5050 models, fortunately.

Something else they have in common is the letter O and the letter C. Yes, that’s right, these are overclocked variants. None of the vendors have listed exactly what the clock speeds are, though. It doesn’t matter because I can tell you now that they won’t be sporting 25% or more clock boosts over the standard 2.57 GHz—it will be a few percent more, at most. It certainly won’t be enough to push the power consumption sky-high, justifying the need for such large coolers.

These models exist for two reasons: (1) saving production costs by reusing a more power-hungry GPU’s cooler and (2) lots of PC gamers associate the physical size of a graphics card with quality and performance. In other words, these triple-fan options are primarily there to shift more RTX 5050 cards at a higher price.

I’m actually more disappointed that I haven’t seen any single-slot 5050s yet because, while we’ve yet to test Nvidia’s baby of the RTX 50 family, from the specs alone, it should be perfectly fine in most games. As long as you stick to 1080p and avoid maxing out the graphics settings, that is. If an RTX 4050 laptop can run Kingdom Come 2: Deliverance at 60 fps (1080p, High preset) with no upscaling, the RTX 5050 will certainly be better.

Which would make it ideal for an ultra-compact PC for office work and basic gaming. Well, it would if there were smaller options to be had. Alas, that 130 W power consumption means that we’re unlikely to see a single-slot model, and due to the tiny size of the GPU itself, passively cooled cards are even more unlikely given the surface area restrictions.

The next-best option I’ve seen so far is Gigabyte’s low-profile RTX 5050—it has three fans, but at least it’s only 182 mm (7.17 inches) in length. Makes you wonder why on Earth Colorful’s iGame OC model needs to be not far off five inches longer. Sheesh.