MSI has confirmed its decision to forgo the production of graphics cards based on AMD’s RDNA 4 architecture, effectively exiting the Radeon RX series market. In a statement shared by the company, an MSI representative confirmed that the company “is not manufacturing AMD GPUs this generation”, signalling a pause in their partnership with AMD while leaving the door open for potential future collaborations.

The company’s commitment to AMD has been steadily declining, evidenced by a dramatic reduction in SKU diversity between generations. The statement shared by Tom’s Hardware further corroborates this, as the company confirmed it will skip this generation entirely.

While MSI produced 45 unique models for the RDNA 2 generation (RX 6000 series), that number plummeted to just four designs for RDNA 3 (RX 7000 series). Furthermore, the limited RDNA 3 offerings, including the flagship RX 7900 XTX, primarily utilised cooling solutions carried over from previous-generation AMD cards, suggesting a reduced R&D investment compared to their Nvidia counterparts.

Several factors have likely contributed to MSI’s decision. Nvidia’s dominant market share, as reflected in Steam hardware surveys, offers a more lucrative return on investment for AIB partners. Additionally, EVGA’s departure from the GPU market in 2022 presented an opportunity for MSI to solidify its position as a premium Nvidia partner. On the other hand, the void left by MSI’s exit creates opportunities for emerging AMD AIBs.

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KitGuru says: There will be no MSI RX 9000 series graphics cards for the time being. Perhaps MSI will revamp its efforts on the AMD graphics side when RDNA 5 comes around.

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