A100 vs RTX A5000: Specs, VRAM & Price
Short answer: choose the A100 when 80 GB of VRAM is the gating requirement. Choose the RTX A5000 when 24 GB is enough for the workload and the lower hourly rate points that way.
The A100 has 80 GB of VRAM; the RTX A5000 has 24 GB.
You can rent both by the hour, no purchase required. A100 from $0.991/GPU/hr; RTX A5000 from $0.176/GPU/hr. The RTX A5000 is 82% cheaper at the entry rate.
A100
Good for training and inference on models that don't need FP8 kernels
RTX A5000
Good for inference and small-scale training workloads
Last updated: 2026-10-10 19:34:10 UTCRefreshes hourly
Specs side by side
| Spec | A100 | RTX A5000 |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 80 GB | 24 GB |
| Memory bandwidth | 2,039 GB/s | 768 GB/s |
| Architecture | Ampere | Ampere |
| Compute capability | 8.0 | 8.6 |
| Precisions in hardware | FP32, FP16, BF16, INT4 | FP32, FP16, BF16, INT4 |
| Peak FP16/BF16 tensor TFLOPS | 312 TFLOPS | – |
| NVLink / multi-GPU interconnect | NVLink 3, 600 GB/s | NVLink, 112.5 GB/s bidirectional |
| Max board power (TDP) | 400W (SXM) | 230W |
| Form factor | SXM4 | – |
| Regions | 6 | 2 |
On-demand price
| Rate | A100 | RTX A5000 |
|---|---|---|
| Lowest per GPU/hr | $1.49/GPU/hr | $0.297/GPU/hr |
Which is better for AI: A100 or RTX A5000?
Choose the A100 when 80 GB of VRAM is the gating requirement. Choose the RTX A5000 when 24 GB is enough for the workload and the lower hourly rate points that way.
A100 vs RTX A5000: common questions
Is the A100 or the RTX A5000 better for AI?
Short answer: choose the A100 when 80 GB of VRAM is the gating requirement. Choose the RTX A5000 when 24 GB is enough for the workload and the lower hourly rate points that way.
Is the A100 or the RTX A5000 cheaper to rent?
On Aquanode's live marketplace the A100 starts at $0.991/GPU/hr (median $1.90/GPU/hr) and the RTX A5000 starts at $0.176/GPU/hr (median $0.295/GPU/hr). The RTX A5000 is the cheaper of the two at the entry rate, by 82%.
What is the difference between the A100 and the RTX A5000?
The A100 has 80 GB of VRAM against the RTX A5000's 24 GB; both are Ampere parts; both run BF16, INT4 workloads in hardware. On price, the A100 lists from $0.991/GPU/hr and the RTX A5000 from $0.176/GPU/hr.
How widely available are the A100 and the RTX A5000?
The A100 is listed in 6 regions and the RTX A5000 in 2 regions right now.
How much does 1,000 GPU-hours cost on the A100 vs the RTX A5000?
At the lowest rates listed today, 1,000 GPU-hours costs $991 on the A100 and $176 on the RTX A5000, a difference of $815 for the same runtime. Rates are per GPU per hour and update hourly.
How much VRAM does the A100 have compared to the RTX A5000?
The A100 has 80 GB of VRAM; the RTX A5000 has 24 GB.
Does the A100 or the RTX A5000 support NVLink?
Yes, both support a multi-GPU interconnect: the A100 has NVLink 3, 600 GB/s and the RTX A5000 has NVLink, 112.5 GB/s bidirectional.
How this comparison is calculated
Every price is normalized to a per-GPU hourly rate using the same pipeline as every other pricing surface on Aquanode, and only the cheapest qualifying offer per provider is shown. A dash means that provider does not currently list that GPU.
Architecture, compute capability and supported precisions come from each vendor's published datasheet for that generation, not from the marketplace feed. This page regenerates at most once per hour.
Memory bandwidth, tensor TFLOPS, NVLink/interconnect and max board power are the same verified-from-datasheet figures shown on each model's own A100 page and RTX A5000 page, which link the primary vendor source for that model. A dash here means Aquanode hasn't verified that figure from a primary source yet, never a guess.
Go further
Check what fits in each card's memory with the A100 VRAM calculator and the RTX A5000 VRAM calculator, see vendor-published throughput in the GPU benchmarks and specs table, or browse every model by generation in the GPU index.
More A100 comparisons
More RTX A5000 comparisons
Related reading: A100 pricing and specs, A100 vs H100, A100 vs V100, and The best GPUs for AI, ranked.
