Nvidia is selling RTX 5080 and RTX 5090 graphics cards from a food truck at GTC

WTF?! It’s almost impossible to find an RTX 5080 or RTX 5090 outside of auction sites right now, especially at MSRP – unless, that is, you happen to be an attendee at Nvidia’s 2025 GPU Technology Conference, where they can be purchased for these prices from a food truck.

From 7AM to 12PM on Thursday and Friday (they were also sold on Wednesday), Nvidia is selling RTX 5080 and RTX 5090 cards at their $999 and $1,999 respective MSRPs from the Nvidia gear van at GTC park.

For obvious security reasons, the cards aren’t all sitting in the van waiting to be handed out like hotdogs. Buyers must pick up their purchased cards from the South Hall main entrance the same day they’re bought.

As Tom’s Hardware notes, there are plenty of caveats with this deal, the biggest being that the cards will only be sold to holders of a conference pass ($1,145 for one day or $2,295 for five days) or an exhibit pass.

Moreover, there are only 2,000 cards up for grabs – 1,000 RTX 5080s and 1,000 RTX 5090s. Unsurprisingly, sales are limited to one card per person. The event is expected to attract some 25,000 attendees this year.

According to on an official X post, Nvidia is selling the cards in bursts: it writes in one that 90 units are available for the next 30 minutes.

🚨 GeForce RTX 5090s are available at the Gear Store in the park right now at #GTC25

90 units are available for the next 30 minutes, with more coming tomorrow. Come say hi! pic.twitter.com/oHdwMlp87r

– NVIDIA AI Developer (@NVIDIAAIDev) March 19, 2025

These cards will end up in the hands of the software developers attending the conference, rather than everyday consumers, of course. Finding one from a retailer is pretty much a pipe dream right now, though you could always pay $6,000 for an in-stock pre-built PC from Best Buy (MSI MEG Visions X AI Gaming Desktop) that packs an Intel Ultra 9 285K and an RTX 5090 – for the rock-bottom price of $6,000.

System builders such as PowerGPU have explained the high price of their Blackwell machines by highlighting how they are also paying a fortune for the RTX 5090/5080 cards. The fact Asus recently raised the prices of its RTX 5090 and AMD RX 9070 series has exacerbated the situation.

Elsewhere at GTC, Nvidia revealed its upcoming lineup of AI-accelerating GPUs, including Blackwell Ultra in 2025, Vera Rubin in 2026, Rubin Ultra in 2027, and Feynman in 2028.