NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090, AI & Machine Learning Comparison
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 wins 52 of 56 benchmarks, averaging 62.3% faster.
Both cards were measured first-party on our bench, same suite, same test rig.
What the numbers say
The gap is widest in LTX-Video (distilled), where NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 leads by 209% (2.17 vs 6.696 frames/s); the closest fight is Nemotron Nano 9B v2 (12% apart).
Benchmark results head-to-head
| Benchmark | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen3 0.6B tok/s | 583.17 | 770.13 | -24% |
| Llama 3.2 1B tok/s | 632.21 | 752.52 | -16% |
| MiniCPM5 2B tok/s | 296.77 | 372.72 | -20% |
| LFM2.5 2.6B tok/s | 314.96 | 385.05 | -18% |
| Granite 4.1 3B tok/s | 227.46 | 276.62 | -18% |
| Nemotron 3 Nano 4B tok/s | 222.39 | 258.12 | -14% |
| Qwen3 4B tok/s | 206.67 | 260.54 | -21% |
| DeepSeek Coder 7B Instruct v1.5 tok/s | 164.74 | 188.59 | -13% |
| Qwen2.5-7B tok/s | 156.51 | 183.66 | -15% |
| Qwen2.5-Coder 7B tok/s | 156.52 | 183.73 | -15% |
| Llama 3 8B tok/s | 146.34 | 167.69 | -13% |
| Llama 3.1 8B tok/s | 144.9 | 171.29 | -15% |
| Qwen3 8B tok/s | 137.59 | 164.32 | -16% |
| Nemotron Nano 9B v2 tok/s | 108.86 | 121.89 | -11% |
| Ornith 1.5 9B tok/s | 124.77 | 144.04 | -13% |
| Gemma 4 12B tok/s | 85.77 | 103.57 | -17% |
| Qwen2.5-Coder 14B tok/s | 78.79 | 95.12 | -17% |
| Qwen3 14B tok/s | 81.11 | 96.37 | -16% |
| gpt-oss-20b tok/s | 231.97 | 286.23 | -19% |
| Gemma 4 26B A4B tok/s | 154.33 | 188.23 | -18% |
| Qwen3.6 27B tok/s | 42.51 | 49.02 | -13% |
| Qwen3.8 27B tok/s | 41.93 | 48.01 | -13% |
| Qwen3 30B A3B tok/s | 202.26 | 259.61 | -22% |
| Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 tok/s | 213.49 | 263.17 | -19% |
| Qwen3-Coder 30B A3B tok/s | 219.07 | 271.04 | -19% |
| Gemma 4 31B tok/s | 39.2 | 45.08 | -13% |
| Qwen3 32B tok/s | 37.95 | 44.28 | -14% |
| Llama 3.3 70B tok/s | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| Stable Diffusion 1.5 images/min | 38.24 | 80.14 | -52% |
| SDXL Turbo images/min | 332.99 | 652.11 | -49% |
| SSD-1B images/min | 7.48 | 15.77 | -53% |
| Sana 1.6B images/min | 20.6 | 41.47 | -50% |
| Stable Diffusion XL images/min | 7.46 | 16.28 | -54% |
| DreamShaper XL Lightning images/min | 47.54 | 91.52 | -48% |
| DreamShaper XL Turbo images/min | 27.3 | 54.35 | -50% |
| Playground v2.5 images/min | 4.79 | 9.96 | -52% |
| PixArt-Sigma XL images/min | 10.9 | 24.27 | -55% |
| FLUX.2 klein 4B images/min | 21.26 | 42.38 | -50% |
| Kolors images/min | 4.69 | 9.88 | -53% |
| Z-Image images/min | 0.63 | 1.17 | -46% |
| Z-Image Turbo images/min | 3.825 | 7.24 | -47% |
| AuraFlow v0.3 images/min | 1.5 | 3.02 | -50% |
| FLUX.1 Kontext dev images/min | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| FLUX.1 dev images/min | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| Qwen-Image-Edit images/min | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| Wan 2.1 1.3B frames/s | 0.341 | 0.673 | -49% |
| LTX-Video (distilled) frames/s | 2.17 | 6.696 | -68% |
| CogVideoX-2B frames/s | 0.241 | 0.517 | -53% |
| CogVideoX-5B frames/s | 0.083 | 0.17 | -51% |
| Stable Video Diffusion clips/min | 1.065 | 2.235 | -52% |
| Wan 2.2 5B (720p) frames/s | 0.22 | 0.43 | -49% |
| LTX-Video (image to video) clips/min | 2.165 | 4.188 | -48% |
| Wan 2.2 TI2V-5B (image to video) clips/min | 0.605 | 1.122 | -46% |
| Stable Video Diffusion XT clips/min | 0.494 | 1.212 | -59% |
| CogVideoX-5B I2V clips/min | 0.15 | 0.328 | -54% |
| TRELLIS.2 Image-to-3D assets/hour | 30.1 | 57.2 | -47% |
Whole-job comparison
How long each card takes to finish a complete pipeline, not just one model. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 is faster on 0 of 5; NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 on 5.
| Workflow | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | Difference | Cost per run |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24-frame storyboard | 8.3 min | 3.8 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 2.15x faster | $0.020 vs $0.022 |
| Full codebase review | 12.7 min | 10.5 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.21x faster | $0.030 vs $0.060 |
| 60-second AI short film | 15.2 min | 5.8 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 2.61x faster | $0.036 vs $0.033 |
| Animate a batch of images | 33.1 min | 17.8 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.85x faster | $0.079 vs $0.101 |
| Short social clips | 42.4 min | 21.5 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.97x faster | $0.101 vs $0.122 |
Renting by the hour, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 finishes 4 of 5 cheaper. The quicker card is not automatically the cheaper way to get the work done.
Cost to rent
| Card | Per hour |
|---|---|
| NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 | $0.143 |
| NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | $0.340 |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 is 2.38x cheaper per hour. Cheapest on-demand rate we see across RunPod and Vast.
Specifications compared
| NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 24GB | 24GB |
| Transistors | 28,300M | 76,300M |
| Die size | 628.4 mm² | 608.4 mm² |
| Process node | 8 nm | 4 nm |
| Transistor density | 45 M/mm² | 125.4 M/mm² |
| Architecture | Ampere (GA102) | Ada Lovelace |
| Memory bandwidth | 936.2 GB/s | 1008 GB/s |
| Boost clock | 1,695 MHz | 2,520 MHz |
| TDP | 350 W | 450 W |
| Launch MSRP | $1,499 | $1,599 |
| Release | 2020-09-24 | 2022-10-12 |
FAQ
- Which is better for ai & machine learning: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 or NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090?
- NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 performs better for ai & machine learning, winning 52 of 56 benchmarks in our suite with an average 62.3% advantage.
- What are the main hardware differences between NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090?
- NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 has 24GB VRAM and a 350W TDP, while NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 has 24GB VRAM and a 450W TDP.
- Where is the biggest performance difference between NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090?
- LTX-Video (distilled): NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 leads by roughly 209% (2.17 vs 6.696 frames/s) in our testing.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 full review · NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 full review · All AI & Machine Learning rankings