The NVIDIA RTX PRO 5500 "Blackwell" workstation card has appeared at a US retailer, surprising buyers by costing more than the flagship RTX PRO 6000. SHI Government Solutions listed the PNY-built model (VCNRTXPRO5500B-PB) with an MSRP of $17,999 and a discounted price of $17,408.63. Meanwhile, NVIDIA's US marketplace lists the RTX PRO 6000 for $16,000, despite that card having more CUDA cores (24,064 vs. 21,760) and more memory (96 GB vs. 84 GB). Even at the discounted rate, the cut-down card costs around $1,400 more. NVIDIA has not announced official pricing since quietly adding the RTX PRO 5500 to its lineup in September.
Videocardz reports that Chinese demand is a major factor driving the RTX PRO 5500's price. According to Reuters, ByteDance, Alibaba, and Tencent have ordered over 3 million cards at roughly $11,400 each, with total orders from China reportedly topping 6 million. One source indicated NVIDIA can produce no more than 3 million units in 2027. With the B300 barred from China and the H200 reviewed case by case, the RTX PRO 5500 remains one of the strongest NVIDIA GPUs Chinese firms can still buy. The card features 28 GDDR7 modules despite climbing memory prices. With orders far exceeding supply, pricing is expected to remain high for the foreseeable future.
Source: TechPowerUp News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing