The RTX 4070’s leaked price tag is a breath of fresh air – I just hope Nvidia delivers

The upcoming Nvidia RTX 4070 has seen its pricing leaked, with an apparent MSRP of $599 at launch according to VideoCardz. Although VideoCardz’s sources didn’t specify any pricing details for outside the US, we can assume from previous RTX 4000 GPU prices that it’ll cost somewhere around £599 / AU$999.

The leaks allegedly come from briefings sent out to press and business partners by Nvidia, which aligns believably with the timeframe of the rumored April 13 release date – so while this is a leak and should be taken with a hearty pinch of salt, it’s very probable that the $599 price tag is accurate (although third-party cards from other manufacturers will likely cost a bit more).

That pricing puts it on par with the launch price of the previous-gen RTX 3070 Ti, demonstrating a step up in generational pricing, but I’m not hugely worried about that: the 3070 Ti was a decent GPU that simply didn’t justify its asking price at the time, while the rumored specs of the RTX 4070 indicate that it should comfortably outperform the last-gen card.

Opinion: This pricing feels more accessible, and that’s a really good thing

Yes, I know, $599 for a graphics card is still expensive. It’s unlikely that the RTX 4070 will find its way onto our list of the best cheap graphics cards – we’ll probably be waiting until the RTX 4060 or 4050 for that.

But this heralds the return of actual midrange cards for the next generation of GPUs – and it looks like Nvidia is going to take an early lead again, with AMD’s cheapest next-gen GPU still the $899 Radeon RX 7900 XT.

I’ve criticized both Nvidia and AMD in the past for inaccessible pricing on the current generation of graphics cards – nobody should really be paying over a thousand bucks for an RTX 4090, if you ask me. But $599 for a 4K-capable gaming GPU with DLSS 3 and much more sensible power requirements than the flagship cards? Talk dirty to me, Nvidia.

Considering that the upcoming GPU’s big brother, the RTX 4070 Ti, is already available at $799 / £799 / AU$1,469, this newly-leaked asking price looks reasonable. That card is currently sitting at the top of our best graphics card ranking thanks to its solid price-to-performance ratio, and I’m really hoping that the 4070 can deliver comparable value at a lower price; especially since they have the same base AD-104 GPU, after the ‘unlaunching’ of the 12GB RTX 4080 last year.

Of course, the proof will be in the pudding: the RTX 4070 will absolutely need to deliver on its expected performance in order to prove its worth, but I’m feeling optimistic about it – something I’ve actually not felt about graphics cards in a while. It’s a good sensation.