Good news for mini gaming PC builders looking for the highest spec graphics card, at least in part. The new flagship Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition graphics card has been added, along with other RTX 50-series gaming GPUs such as the RTX 5080, to Nvidia’s SFF-Ready certification list for small form factor PC builds.
Bigger Nvidia RTX 40-series cards like the RTX 4090 were excluded from this list due to their size, meaning that SFF builders couldn’t guarantee using the best graphics card available in their SFF-Ready PC case. In a surprising turn of events, though, the new flagship RTX 5090 Founders Edition looks to be an incredibly slim affair, with a reduced PCB size and a clever new cooler helping to reduce it to only a two slot thickness. This makes producing a top spec, mini gaming PC build a possibility this time around.
Nvidia introduced the SFF-Ready certification in 2024, providing buyers with an easy to understand list of GPUs and small form factor PC cases that are compatible with each other. The requirements for graphics cards include a maximum height (including power cable bend radius) of 5.94 inches (151mm), a 11.96-inch (304mm) maximum length, and a 1.96-inch (50mm, or 2.5-slot) maximum thickness. Meanwhile, for a case to be certified, it has to provide a graphics card space that’s 50mm wide, 154.5mm high and 312mm tall.
The original list, aimed at RTX 40-series cards, included no RTX 4090 models, as no cards using this GPU are sensibly-sized enough to fit in these case/card size limits. Instead, only RTX 4070, 4070 Ti, 4070 Super, and 4080 cards were included.
However, the slim profile of the Founders Edition RTX 5090 means it remarkably does fit within the standard, and quite comfortably too. It’s only Nvidia’s own RTX 5090 design that does, though, as no other RTX 5090 card is yet small enough to make the cut. There are, however, plenty of other RTX 50-series series cards, including the RTX 5080, RTX 5070 Ti, and RTX 5070, that are included.
Founders Edition GPUs have often been a touch smaller and more visually understated than third party options, a point which has caused consternation with some graphics card manufacturers, as it’s left them struggling to compete with the generally desirable Nvidia-made cards. However, third-party graphics cards often include much larger coolers, RGB lighting, overclocked specs, and other design tweaks to make them stand out, with them often running cooler and quieter, too.
If you’re tempted by this SFF-Ready RTX 5090, though, there could be another factor to consider, and that’s stock availability. At launch, Founders Edition cards like the RTX 5090 FE may be hard to get hold of, at least at their $1,999 MSRP. Nvidia will need to have produced enough of these cards to fulfil the likely very high demand.
Potential stock issues aside, the addition of even a single RTX 5090 card at all to the SFF-Ready list is frankly impressive, especially as the increased 575W TDP over the 4090 in theory makes thermals harder to manage. It would be incredible if Nvidia kept the RTX 5090 the same size as the RTX 4090, let alone make it so it fits in an SFF gaming PC.
You can check out the full Nvidia SFF-Ready certification list at the Nvidia website. In the meantime, check out our best mini gaming PC guide for pre-built options if you want your build to get extra small without the hassle of building it yourself. Be sure to check our best PC cases guide for some recommendations of top tier cases in all sizes, too.
You can also check out our RTX 5090 guide for a run through of all the specs and features of this top-spec Nvidia powerhouse.