A Record Order
Reuters reported exclusively on October 20, 2026 that Chinese tech giants including ByteDance, Alibaba, and Tencent have ordered more than 3 million Nvidia RTX PRO 5500 graphics cards, with a combined value exceeding $35 billion — one of the largest GPU purchases on record.
Three Key Points
- Workstation cards carry the compute load: The RTX PRO 5500 costs about $11,400 per unit and is built for AI inference rather than large-scale training. Under tightening US export controls, the Blackwell flagship B300 is fully banned for China and the H200 faces case-by-case licensing review, making the RTX PRO 5500 the most capable Nvidia product Chinese buyers can still legally obtain.
- Easy to order, hard to receive: Total orders from Chinese customers have reportedly topped 6 million units, while Nvidia's planned global production for 2027 is only about 3 million cards. Nvidia estimates actual fulfillment may reach just 5%-10% of ordered quantities. Samples are expected in December, with volume deliveries starting in Q1 2027.
- Controls reshape the market: The orders reflect a trend of Chinese buyers shifting to compliant lower-spec products, while capacity bottlenecks make "compliant but unavailable" an even harsher reality.
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