$4,429 order for a ROG Astral RTX 5090 cancelled by Nvidia due to a ‘late’ price increase, with Asus blamed — marketplace buyer refunded after immediate $500 increase, with top-spec GPU now almost 2.5x higher than MSRP

Nvidia has reportedly begun to cancel orders for RTX 5090 graphics cards that were placed prior to raising their price, according to a Redditor’s own report. The claim, made in the Asus ROG subreddit, suggests that an order for an Asus ROG Astral RTX 5090 BTF graphics card was cancelled and a refund issued.

The purchaser, who made their order through Nvidia’s marketplace, was reportedly given the choice to pay the “new price” for the GPU or to lose out. Meanwhile, contact with Nvidia’s customer support team, shared in a later post, placed the blame at Asus’ door instead, suggesting that it’s actually Asus’ fault for failing to notify them of the GPU’s new pricing.

Update from yesterday canceled order from r/ASUSROG

IndependentOk1031 shared their story on Reddit over the last two days. In their original post, the Redditor explains that the order was for Asus to fulfil, even at the “stupid high” price of $4,429 (or $4,607 after taxes), but it was later cancelled. An updated post shared since then goes on to explain that, after reaching out to customer support, an Nvidia customer care agent suggested that Asus wasn’t happy to fulfil the order at the price that it was listed for at the point of order, which the Redditor suggests was Friday, July 31.

According to Nvidia, that’s because the “price change update” was provided a “little late,” resulting in the cancellation. Nvidia suggests that it did try to get Asus to honor the order but, according to its agent, Asus was “unable to fulfil it at the previous price rate.” As a result, Nvidia wasn’t able to make any further steps forward. The same GPU is now listed on Nvidia’s website for $4,929.99 before tax, an increase of $500 (or 11.28%). The Redditor is still waiting on contact from an Asus supervisor to discuss the situation but notes that “the odds of anything happening are slim.”

This follows reports last week of Nvidia price rises at major tech retailers in the United States, including at Best Buy and Amazon. While the RTX 5090 Founders Edition continues to hold an MSRP of $1,999, a price still listed prominently on Nvidia’s website, pricing for this top-spec GPU means consumers have to pay thousands of dollars more. Third-party pricing data from CamelCamelCamel shows that the lowest ever pricing for this high-end Asus ROG card on Amazon to date has been $3,289.09, with current pricing set at $4,849.99 from a seller.

As our GPU price index shows, this phenomenon isn’t restricted to the RTX 5090. Current and last-gen Nvidia and AMD graphics cards across the board have all seen significant price rises in a market being badly affected by the AI boom. The cost of memory has pushed the manufacturing costs up, while the demand for the cards themselves caused by AI has caused the retail price to soar further.

With no location mentioned, it’s unclear if the Redditor has any other remedies to pursue his case further. Either way, a near-$600 price hike for a GPU already costing over two times its MSRP demonstrates the significant strain facing buyers globally in the current PC hardware market. With no sign that the market is likely to cool any time soon, buyers looking for the best GPU on sale right now could see further price hikes in the months ahead.