If you’ve taken even a cursory glance at the graphics card market lately, you’ve probably put your head your hands in despair. It’s rough out there right now, with Nvidia’s new RTX 50-series cards impossible to find and outrageously overpriced on second hand markets, and it’s last-generation RTX 40-series all but sold out and no-longer in production. AMD’s best alternatives are likewise absent while we await the impending launch of the RX 9070 and 9070 XT — and we have everything crossed they’ll be available in good quantities.
But if your PC just died or you don’t want to be an early adopter of a new GPU that could melt your power connectors, what are you supposed to do? While second-hand cards are always an option, it’s a tricky one to recommend since you never know what those cards were used for, or even if you’re actually buying a box trying to lure in scalper bots.
There are some good-ish GPU deals out there though. Here are some of the best we could find.
Note: Most of the cards we’re recommending here are only available in small quantities at suggested pricing, so apologies in advance if they’re gone by the time you get to them.
AMD RX 7800XT
This last-generation card was one of our favorite 1080p or 1440p gaming graphics cards when it debuted in September 2023, and though it’s getting a little long in the tooth, its specs aren’t bad, and its availability and pricing is strong enough that we don’t feel too terrible recommending it.
With 16GB of VRAM, too, it’s relatively futureproofed where a lot of its contemporaries will feel outdated in 2025.
We found a few examples of this at just north of $500. That’s more than it launched at, but considering the overpriced nature of many of the alternatives, this is what passes for value this year. If you buy it through a major retailer, too, you can use the included code to get a free copy of Monster Hunter: Wilds. That’s worth $70 in its own right.
Nvidia RTX 4060
I know, it’s an 8GB VRAM graphics card and I hate to recommend that in 2025… but it’s $300. Really, at this price we should be recommending the much-newer and equally capable Intel B580, but that card is so good and such good value, that it’s now priced north of $400 at most retailers. That’s incredibly frustrating, so there’s this instead.
While the limited VRAM isn’t great, $300 is about as affordable as graphics cards get at the moment, and you get support for DLSS 4 and frame generation, which does open up the potential for high FPS in some supporting games.
AMD RX 7700 XT
The RX 7700 XT has been on our recommended GPU list for months now. While it didn’t blow us away in our initial review, it’s solidified itself as a great value pick around $400, and amazingly that’s held strong during this recent pricing calamity.
Its performance is somewhere around the 3070 Ti mark, making it a little faster than the 4060 Ti, and a little slower than the 4070 (non-super), so an excellent choice for 1080p or 1440p gaming. It has 12GB of VRAM, which isn’t astronomical by modern standards, but it’s well ahead of anything else you’ll find at this price.
AMD RX 7600
This might be approaching the bottom of the barrel, but the 7600 is a capable enough GPU that it’ll see you right for 1080p esports and casual gaming. Its 8GB of VRAM is a little archaic in 2025, but then this card is much cheaper than the 4060, and that’s all that card sports.
At just north of $250, the 7600 is about the best you can buy at this low price point. It’s not great, but it’ll get you gaming and with no sign of ultra budget graphics cards coming from AMD or Nvidia in the near future, you might even be able to resell it in a few months and recoup most of your original purchase.
But you should probably wait…
All of the above recommendations aside, if you can hold off just one more week, it’ll probably be worth it. AMD’s RX 9070 and 9070 XT graphics cards are hitting store shelves on March 6 and AMD is promising “wide availability.” We can’t confirm for sure how well these cards will perform until the embargo drops, and availability may still not be enough to overwhelm scalpers and early gamer demand. But we do know more GPUs are coming, and if they can help fill the GPU-sized hole in the market, that might just help bring prices down to some semblance of normality.
If you can’t wait, though, the above options are great picks if you are strict with your budget. Do not overpay for them.
