NVIDIA A40 vs NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing), AI & Machine Learning Comparison
NVIDIA A40 wins 6 of 7 benchmarks, averaging 33.4% faster.
Both cards' numbers are anchored estimates calibrated against our measured cards, pending first-party measurement. Treat small gaps as ties.
What the numbers say
The gap is widest in Stable Diffusion XL, where NVIDIA A40 leads by 55% (9.2 vs 5.94 images/min); the closest fight is Qwen2.5-Coder 14B (24% apart); VRAM decides part of this one: NVIDIA A40 runs 8 of our 12 AI workloads while the other card runs 4, models that don't fit score zero.
Benchmark results head-to-head
| Benchmark | NVIDIA A40 | NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen3 4B tok/s | 160.79 | 125.23 | +28% |
| Llama 3.1 8B tok/s | 106.18 | 84.21 | +26% |
| Qwen2.5-Coder 14B tok/s | 57.85 | 46.54 | +24% |
| Qwen3 32B tok/s | 26.89 | 0 | n/a |
| Llama 3.3 70B tok/s | 0 | 0 | n/a |
| Stable Diffusion XL images/min | 9.2 | 5.94 | +55% |
| FLUX.1 dev images/min | 1.95 | 0 | n/a |
Whole-job comparison
How long each card takes to finish a complete pipeline, not just one model. NVIDIA A40 is faster on 1 of 1; NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing) on 0.
| Workflow | NVIDIA A40 | NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full codebase review | 17.3 min | 21.5 min | NVIDIA A40 1.24x faster |
Specifications compared
| NVIDIA A40 | NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing) | |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 48GB | 24GB |
| Architecture | Ampere | Turing (TU102) |
| Memory bandwidth | 696 GB/s | 672 GB/s |
| Boost clock | 1,740 MHz | 1,770 MHz |
| TDP | 300 W | 260 W |
| Launch MSRP | $5,000 | $6,300 |
| Release | 2020-10-05 | 2018-08-14 |
FAQ
- Which is better for ai & machine learning: NVIDIA A40 or NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing)?
- NVIDIA A40 performs better for ai & machine learning, winning 6 of 7 benchmarks in our suite with an average 33.4% advantage.
- What are the main hardware differences between NVIDIA A40 and NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing)?
- NVIDIA A40 has 48GB VRAM and a 300W TDP, while NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing) has 24GB VRAM and a 260W TDP.
- Does VRAM matter more than speed between NVIDIA A40 and NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing)?
- For AI, yes, NVIDIA A40 fits 4 more of our 12 workloads than NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing). A model that exceeds VRAM doesn't run slower, it doesn't run at all, so the card that fits the model wins that workload outright.
- Where is the biggest performance difference between NVIDIA A40 and NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing)?
- Stable Diffusion XL: NVIDIA A40 leads by roughly 55% (9.2 vs 5.94 images/min) in our testing.
NVIDIA A40 full review · NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 (Turing) full review · All AI & Machine Learning rankings