Asus is pricing an RTX 5080 gaming laptop at $4,799, which is higher than the cost of last year's RTX 5090 model.

      **TL;DR**: Asus has introduced the 2026 ROG Zephyrus G16 equipped with an RTX 5080 priced at $4,799. In contrast, the 2025 model featuring a stronger RTX 5090 is available for $4,599 on Amazon.

      Asus has discreetly launched an RTX 5080 version of the ROG Zephyrus G16 (2026) in the United States, with a retail price of $4,799. This is $200 higher than the 2025 ROG Zephyrus G16, which includes a more powerful RTX 5090 GPU and 64GB of RAM, currently priced at $4,599 on Amazon and Newegg. It's notable that a newer model with a less powerful graphics card is more expensive than its predecessor with a superior one.

      The new iteration combines Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 5080 with Intel’s Core Ultra 9 386H, the first Panther Lake processor featured in a gaming laptop. The configuration includes 64GB of LPDDR5X RAM, a 1TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD, and a 16-inch 2.5K OLED display delivering 240Hz with a peak brightness of 1,100 nits. Asus indicates that the GPU’s total graphics power can reach up to 160W in manual mode, which is 20W more than the previous RTX 5070 Ti variant that was the only option in the US.

      The RTX 5080 offers a notable upgrade over the 5070 Ti, featuring 16GB of GDDR7 VRAM as opposed to the 5070 Ti’s 12GB. Benchmarks indicate it provides approximately 15 to 23 percent improved gaming performance depending on the resolution. This configuration also sees the RAM increased from 32GB to 64GB.

      However, the RTX 5080 is not as powerful as the RTX 5090. Nvidia's high-end laptop GPU boasts 24GB of VRAM and around 10 percent better gaming performance than the 5080, according to benchmarks conducted on Blackwell-generation hardware. In the 2025 Zephyrus G16, the faster GPU is teamed with Intel’s Arrow Lake Core Ultra 9 285H and 64GB of RAM for an equivalent price of $4,599 at third-party retailers.

      The $4,799 price for the 2026 model reflects a $1,100 increase compared to the RTX 5070 Ti version of the same laptop, representing a 29 percent rise. A portion of this increase is justifiable due to the GPU upgrade and doubled memory. Nevertheless, the fact that customers can purchase last year’s model with a superior GPU at a lower price complicates the value justification.

      There is some context that sheds light on the pricing situation. The $4,599 figure for the 2025 RTX 5090 model is sourced from third-party retailers on Amazon and Newegg, not Asus’s official store. Best Buy originally listed the 32GB version of the same laptop at $4,400 at launch, and it has since been reduced to $3,799.

      While the comparison is not exact, the outcome for consumers remains the same: the older, faster model is more affordable wherever found.

      Intel’s Panther Lake platform is also newly introduced, with new components typically carrying a premium. The Core Ultra 9 386H utilizes Intel’s 18A manufacturing process, the company’s first sub-2nm node, featuring 16 cores divided into three categories: four performance cores, eight efficiency cores, and four low-power cores. Whether the CPU upgrade warrants an additional $200 over a laptop with a better GPU will be assessed differently by each consumer.

      Additionally, the broader hardware market is unfavorable for consumers. Prices for DDR5 memory have surged significantly in 2026 due to Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron shifting production capacity from consumer DRAM to high-bandwidth memory for AI data centers. A 64GB LPDDR5X kit that was under $120 last year now ranges between $300 and $500.

      This cost is being transferred to every laptop that comes equipped with high-capacity memory.

      Asus has already been criticized for its pricing strategy with the RTX 5080 product lineup. The ROG NUC 16 mini PC recently launched in China for $4,400 with only a minor 2.3 percent benchmark improvement over its predecessor, resulting in backlash from consumers who anticipated more for a $1,200 year-over-year price hike. The pricing of the Zephyrus G16 follows a similar trend, featuring significant component upgrades that don't correspond entirely to the price increase.

      For buyers who prioritize GPU performance, the decision is straightforward. The 2025 ROG Zephyrus G16 with the RTX 5090 provides greater graphical power for less money, even though its CPU is from an