Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050's cryptocurrency mining prowess revealed by new leak

The GeForce RTX 3050 undoubtedly generated some hype at its CES 2022 reveal. However, that excitement died down pretty quick because the graphics card had just enough VRAM for cryptocurrency mining. So it begs the question, just how well does the RTX 3050 mine cryptocurrency. Videocardz and Twitter user @wxnod have the answer to that question, at least for Ethereum.

Videocardz heard from its sources that the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 could mine Ethereum at 12.5MH/s, which was corroborated by @wxnod, who states that it can go as high as 13.66MH/s. Both figures are less than the GeForce RTX 3060's hash rate of 35MH/s. It seems that the GeForce RTX 3050, much like most Ampere cards produced in H2, 2021, comes with a built-in hash-rate limiter.

Tumbling Ethereum prices combined with the awfully high investment recuperation time makes the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 a terrible choice for miners. However, that only eliminates a part of the problem, as it will do nothing to dissuade scalpers from flipping the card at inflated prices. Yes, the GeForce RTX 3050 is horrible at mining, but how well can it play games? Based on its spec sheet alone, we can expect it to outperform the Radeon RX 6500, but that isn't really saying much.