NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 vs NVIDIA RTX A5000, AI & Machine Learning Comparison
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 wins 8 of 12 benchmarks, averaging 67.7% faster.
Both cards were measured first-party on our bench, same suite, same test rig.
What the numbers say
The gap is widest in Stable Diffusion XL, where NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 leads by 118% (16.28 vs 7.46 images/min); the closest fight is Llama 3.1 8B (43% apart).
Benchmark results head-to-head
| Benchmark | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | NVIDIA RTX A5000 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen3 4B tok/s | 260.54 | 171.68 | +52% |
| Llama 3.1 8B tok/s | 171.29 | 119.86 | +43% |
| Qwen2.5-Coder 14B tok/s | 95.12 | 64.89 | +47% |
| Qwen3 32B tok/s | 44.28 | 30.49 | +45% |
| Llama 3.3 70B tok/s | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| Stable Diffusion XL images/min | 16.28 | 7.46 | +118% |
| Z-Image Turbo images/min | 7.425 | 4.05 | +83% |
| FLUX.1 dev images/min | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| FLUX.1 Kontext dev images/min | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| Qwen-Image-Edit images/min | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| LTX-Video (distilled) frames/s | 4.7 | 2.7 | +74% |
| Wan 2.2 5B (720p) frames/s | 0.43 | 0.24 | +79% |
Whole-job comparison
How long each card takes to finish a complete pipeline, not just one model. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 is faster on 4 of 4; NVIDIA RTX A5000 on 0.
| Workflow | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | NVIDIA RTX A5000 | Difference | Cost per run |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24-frame storyboard | 5 min | 7 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.40x faster | $0.013 vs $0.019 |
| 60-second AI short film | 7.9 min | 11.8 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.48x faster | $0.021 vs $0.031 |
| Full codebase review | 10.5 min | 15.4 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.47x faster | $0.027 vs $0.041 |
| 10 short social clips | 22.7 min | 37.2 min | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 1.64x faster | $0.059 vs $0.099 |
Renting by the hour, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 finishes 4 of 4 cheaper. The quicker card is not automatically the cheaper way to get the work done.
Cost to rent
| Card | Per hour |
|---|---|
| NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | $0.155 |
| NVIDIA RTX A5000 | $0.160 |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 is 1.03x cheaper per hour. Cheapest on-demand rate we see across RunPod and Vast.
Specifications compared
| NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 | NVIDIA RTX A5000 | |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 24GB | 24GB |
| Architecture | Ada Lovelace | Ampere (GA102 derivative) |
| Memory bandwidth | 1008 GB/s | 768 GB/s |
| Boost clock | 2,520 MHz | 1,695 MHz |
| TDP | 450 W | 230 W |
| Launch MSRP | $1,599 | $2,250 |
| Release | 2022-10-12 | 2021-04-12 |
FAQ
- Which is better for ai & machine learning: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 or NVIDIA RTX A5000?
- NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 performs better for ai & machine learning, winning 8 of 12 benchmarks in our suite with an average 67.7% advantage.
- What are the main hardware differences between NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 and NVIDIA RTX A5000?
- NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 has 24GB VRAM and a 450W TDP, while NVIDIA RTX A5000 has 24GB VRAM and a 230W TDP.
- Where is the biggest performance difference between NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 and NVIDIA RTX A5000?
- Stable Diffusion XL: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 leads by roughly 118% (16.28 vs 7.46 images/min) in our testing.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 full review · NVIDIA RTX A5000 full review · All AI & Machine Learning rankings