While current speculation would place the release date of the RTX 5090 sometime in early 2025, some fresh leaks have been generating plenty of discussion online. We recently covered a new RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 specs leak and one of the major revelations was the high 600W TDP/TGP (Thermal Design Power/Total Graphics Power) of the new flagship 5090. For reference, the 4090 is rated for just 450W.
We say “just”, but 450W is still a massive amount of power draw, and the idea that the 5090 may crush that has people wondering about cooling solutions. Questions are being asked about the GPU’s cooler, with some drawing the conclusion that it must feature liquid cooling.
Will the RTX 5090 FE be liquid cooled?
Nvidia has yet to disclose what the cooling solution of the RTX 5090 is, nor have they confirmed any specific details about the upcoming RTX 50 series. The cooling on Nvidia’s own Founders Edition cards has always stuck to traditional air cooling, though we have seen plenty of liquid-cooled variants from AIB partners in the past, especially for the high-end SKUs (or you could attach a separate GPU water block). As such, we expect Nvidia to do the same this time around – but not everyone sees it this way, and there’s a good reason for that.
This speculation has been spurred on by one of the details the original leaker, kopite7kimi, revealed. They claim that the RTX 5090 will be using a 2-slot cooler. However, this has some people saying that it “must be some type of liquid cooled design”, another saying “it’s just not possible to adequately air cool a 600W GPU”. Lastly, and most humorously, “it will burn“.
Again, it’s worth mentioning that all these design choices remain speculation for now. While the leaked specs do offer a promising indication of what’s to come in Nvidia’s next-gen graphics cards, we can’t know for sure how the finalized design will end up. And in any case, we expect there to be a solid selection of liquid-cooled models from board partners considering the supposed high power draw; just like we had with the RTX 4090.
