NVIDIA released the GeForce RTX 3080 12 GB very silently in January. At their CES event, there was no mention of the card, and it suddenly appeared on the market on January 12th. I had samples of the ASUS STRIX OC and MSI Suprim X, but NVIDIA didn't provide a driver before launch—rather, they waited until after launch to post their drivers. At that point, I was already on my ski holiday, and had to take care of other new releases since then, which is why you're getting this review only just today; the ASUS STRIX RTX 3080 12 GB today and MSI RTX 3080 Suprim X next week.

With the RTX 3080 12 GB, NVIDIA addresses the concern in the community that "10 GB is not enough" on the RTX 3080. While there are certainly specific scenarios where that is true, across a wide range of titles, even at highest settings and 4K, this is a non-issue—we specifically looked at VRAM usage for this review. Even when we enabled ray tracing, there wasn't a significant framerate difference between 10 GB and 12 GB. Yes, few games will exceed 10 GB VRAM at 4K with RT on, but these VRAM usage numbers are actually allocations. A game putting a texture or model into VRAM doesn't mean it will be used all the time. Rather, many games are optimistic—as much memory as possible is filled in hopes those assets are used in the near future.

Averaged over our test suite, we found the ASUS RTX 3080 12 GB STRIX OC to be a whopping 7% faster than the RTX 3080. These are pretty serious gains that put the card VERY close to the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, which has 12 GB, too, but comes with more cores. The reason for the 7% performance increase is definitely not the VRAM size alone; actually, a lot of factors contribute here. In order of contribution, I'd say it's the increased number of GPU cores, higher power limit, higher clocks, wider memory bus width, and bigger VRAM size. Compared to the RTX 3080 Ti at 4K resolution, the RTX 3080 STRIX 12 GB is only 3% slower, and the much more expensive RTX 3090 is only 4% faster. In the fight against AMD's offerings, the ASUS STRIX can beat the Radeon RX 6900 XT by 3%, and it's almost 10% faster than the RX 6800 XT.

With those performance numbers, the card is the perfect choice for 4K gaming at 60 FPS and above. It's probably the only resolution you should consider for this beast because even at 1440p, we've seen some titles get CPU limited—for 1080p, it's definitely overkill. On the other hand, if you have a strong CPU and 1440p high-refresh-rate monitor, the 3080 12 GB could be an option, too. Not for its increased VRAM size, but the added GPU horsepower. The extra performance and VRAM increase over the RTX 3080 10 GB could also give you more headroom in case future games significantly increase their hardware requirements, which seems unlikely considering the new consoles are out and their hardware specifications will define what's possible for the next few years.

In terms of ray tracing performance, there are no big surprises: The RTX 3080 12 GB is faster than the RTX 3080 10 GB due to the reasons listed above, and it's quite close to the RTX 3080 Ti. In the duel against AMD's offerings, NVIDIA Ampere GPUs clearly have the upper hand because they execute more ray tracing instructions in hardware. AMD is addressing this "problem" by teaming up with developers to ensure they implement watered-down ray tracing that doesn't come with as big a performance hit. Since AMD is the hardware provider of the new consoles, developers also have an incentive to make sure their RT implementation works best on consoles, too. I'm sure we'll learn more about whether this trend can persist in the coming months, or if the only option for serious ray tracing will continue to be NVIDIA GeForce.

We've seen the mammoth ASUS STRIX cooler in several reviews before, and it's doing an excellent job keeping the card cool. With just 66°C under load, the card runs extremely cool despite the high heat output due to the increased power consumption. However, to achieve these temperatures, ASUS opted for relatively high fan speed, which results in noise levels of 39 dBA—this is definitely not quiet. While not terribly loud either, given these temperatures, I feel like a better balance could have been found. Good thing ASUS includes a dual BIOS feature with their card, which reduces fan speed considerably, allowing slightly higher temperatures in return. With 32.7 dBA, the card is now "quiet"—impressive for a 4K60 card, and temperatures are only marginally increased. 73°C, or 7°C higher, is really "barely warm" for a modern GPU and not significantly different to 66°C with the exception that noise levels are much more enjoyable. Compared to the MSI Suprim X, the ASUS cooler is a little bit better, as our apples-to-apples heatsink testing reveals; however, differences are minimal. The MSI card has dual BIOS too, with quiet mode being the default, which is the same noise level as the ASUS STRIX.

ASUS is using the same incredibly strong 18+3 VRM design on their RTX 3080 12 GB STRIX OC as on the RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3090—very nice. This does affect idle power consumption though, which is higher than expected. The RGB illumination certainly plays a role in that, too. While the non-gaming power consumption increase might look like a lot, it's not. Technically, it's 20 W instead of 10 W, or double, but we're talking a few added dollars in electricity cost per year—not much when you consider the $1700 price of this card. Gaming power consumption is increased, too, to 400 W in typical gaming, which is a lot, 50 W more than the RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3090. This also hurts efficiency, which is roughly 10% lower than the regular RTX 3080. The underlying reason is that ASUS bumped their board power limit significantly to achieve higher performance out of the box. This runs the card at a less efficient operating point, though; the gains are not 1:1. Still, given the topnotch cooler I don't think this is a dealbreaker.

Overclocking worked well on our card. After a few minutes, we gained another 6% in real-life performance, which lets the card beat the RTX 3080 Ti and RTX 3090. For more serious overclockers, ASUS offering a 450 W manual adjustment range for its power limiter will prove useful. The MSI RTX 3080 12 GB Suprim X has a 20 W lower power limit and 20 W lower adjustment range. Just like on other high-end graphics cards, you should not cheap out on the power supply—at least 800 W are a good choice here.

Back in 2020, NVIDIA offered the original RTX 3080 at an MSRP of $700—yeah, I had to lol too when I wrote this. If you can find an RTX 3080 at that price (or close to it), buy it, there is absolutely nothing that would come close in price/performance. The RTX 3080 12 GB is positioned well north of $1500, which is more than twice the RTX 3080 10 GB MSRP. This is probably why NVIDIA refrained from a big launch, as several outlets still compare MSRPs, which would be a great source of drama. When looking at current, realistic market prices, the RTX 3080 10 GB costs around $1400, RTX 3080 Ti $1750, and RX 6900 XT $1500. This suddenly makes the $1700 RTX 3080 12 GB ASUS STRIX OC look much less crazy, and the RTX 3080 12 GB is even in stock right now. It still won't be an easy sell because just $50 more gets you an RTX 3080 Ti, which is faster, and psychologically more advanced due to the "Ti", which might lead to better resale value, too. For $1750, you're not getting an ultra-premium RTX 3080 Ti though, but rather the cost-optimized cards. If cooling and noise particularly are important for you, maybe do consider the ASUS STRIX. Compared to the RTX 3080, it probably comes down to cost. If you can find an RTX 3080 at or near MSRP, that will be the best choice; buy some for me, too. At around $1400, I'd probably still prefer the 10 GB version because there's no way you're getting back $300, or +20% in performance. Compared to a $1500 (or higher) RTX 3080 10 GB, I think I'd pick the RTX 3080 12 GB instead. Also, if you've been moaning about "only 10 GB on the RTX 3080," you might as well consider the RTX 3080 12 GB for future-proofing, if you believe in that.

I'm giving our Recommended award to the RTX 3080 STRIX because it's a fantastic custom-design with an excellent cooler, good factory overclock, large power limit increase, and good fan settings (in quiet mode). It was a close call though, because the card is definitely not for everyone at that price point; it's just SO much money. But if you're in the market for a high-end graphics card, it's definitely a product worth considering.