The Best Gaming PC Builds Under $3000

Looking to build a PC for under $3000? Here are our recommended builds for the perfect price!

At $3,000, a gaming PC can perform well under heavy loads, and you can even make some aesthetic choices rather than just outright performance. In this article, we will be going over the best builds you can put together for under $3,000. If you are looking for a lower budget level, be sure to check out our article for the best gaming pc builds under $500.

These builds are a great place to start, but if you want to use a different case, for example, there is nothing wrong with that. That is the best thing about building your own PC, after all.

The Intel Core i7-13700K absolutely dominates the top-tier sector for value. In fact, with the right cooling and overclocking, this top-tier CPU can beat most of the non-X3D AMD competition. Plus, if you have a 600 series motherboard from your previous CPU, this will work - with a bios update in towThe processor has 16 cores divided into 8 P-cores and 8 E-cores, and 24 processing threads. The processor comes with an integrated Intel UHD Graphics 770, maximum clock speed is 5.2 GHz.

Powered by NVIDIA DLSS3, ultra-efficient Ada Lovelace arch, and full ray tracing, the RTX 4070 Ti is part of the newest generation of NVIDIA GPUs. This version from Asus has Axial-tech fans scaled up for 21% more airflow. With how powerful this card is, exceptional cooling is needed.

The ASRock Z790 Pro supports 13th Gen & 12th Gen Intel Core Processors and has plenty of room for storage expansion with 4x M.2 NVME connectors. There is a 2.5 GB/s LAN port to ensure a stable and fast internet connection. This motherboard supports up to 128 GB of RAM with its 4 DDR4 slots. This is a perfect board to start any high-end PC build with.

The XPG DDR4 D50 RGB 32GB (2x16GB) 3600MHz RAM kits are an excellent choice for users looking to upgrade to quality DDR4 rams that are compatible and up to speed with the latest Intel platforms while offering continued support for the large Ryzen market for processors from the 5000 series and under without costing an arm and a leg for very good-looking memory.

The Samsung 990 Pro is Samsung's latest and greatest PCI-E 4.0 SSD endeavor and it delivers blazing fast read and write speeds with a solid 5-year warranty and excellent software support in tow via the Samsung Magician software suite allowing you to tweak, benchmark, and customize how your SSD functions to a fair degree

The Corsair iCUE 4000X ATX Mid Tower case is a beautiful case that is easy to build in, making it a perfect starting point for any PC build. In addition, this case has excellent cooling potential with space for 6x 120 mm or 4x 140 mm cooling fans and multiple radiators, including a 360 mm in front and 280 mm in the roof.The tempered glass side panel makes it easy to admire your PC build, and there is way less of a scratch risk than there is with plastic side panels.

The Noctua NH-D15 CPU Cooler is all about maximizing your CPU's cooling, doing so with as little noise as possible. Using the bundled dual Noctua NF-A15 PWM fans and low-noise adapters, the NH-D15 is a capable air-based CPU cooler that has a no-frills, all-business approach to its job of cooling some of the beefiest CPUs available in the market assisted by the bundled high-end NT-H1 thermal paste.

The C Series fits any ATX case and supports most of the latest NVIDIA 30 series and AMD 6000 series GPUs. This PSU uses DC-DC technology to allow the operation to generate less heat to reduce the fan RPM. The 135 mm PWM silent fan ensures the power supply can silently operate at a high load.The fully modular design eliminates clutter at the bottom of the case, ultimately keeping your PC cooler.

This first build is the most price-to-performance-based PC on this list. Starting with the Intel Core i7-13700K this processor has 8 Performance-cores with 16 threads and 8 Efficient-cores. This is the K version, so it can be overclocked, although if you do go for that, you might want to check out a water-cooling solution instead of the Noctua NH-D15. By no means is the Noctua NH-D15 a lousy cooler, it is excellent actually, but, in general, the 13th-generation Intel processors overheat pretty quickly after being overclocked and there is plenty of room left in your budget for an upgrade if you so choose.

Pairing the i7-13700K with the RTX 4070 Ti ensures excellent gaming performance. We recommend picking up a high refresh rate monitor to experience the full performance of this GPU. 1 TB of NVME storage is a great place to start building a game library, and the ASRock Z790 Pro has more room to upgrade the storage in the future if needed.

Best PSUs For Your Gaming PC

The top-of-the-line AMD CPU, the Ryzen 9 7950X features 16 cores and 32 threads to handle both single-threaded and multithreaded applications better than ever. While the 7950X might not be able to meet up to the 13th generation Intel CPUs, AMD still completely demolished their previous Ryzen 5000 series, showing they're still heading in the right direction.

The Gigabyte Aorus Master RTX 4080 is a beauty to say the least. It comes with an excellent vapor chamber-based design and its Windforce cooling fan system. With the Edge view LCD, you get an excellent-looking window as to how your GPU is doing in real-time which contrasts beautifully with the rest of the GPU's design. To top it all off, with Dual Bios in play, you can go overclocked or quiet with the press of a button.

The ASRock X670E PG Lightning Gaming Motherboard is one of the best value purchases you can get when it comes to a gaming motherboard for the AM5 socket/Ryzen 7000 processor lineup. Featuring the full X670E chipset coupled with extensive I/O options, the X670E does sacrifice Wi-Fi despite offering antenna cutouts on its IO plate but more than makes up for it with its value proposition

The CORSAIR Vengeance DDR5 5600MHz 16G x 2 Kit is a capable DDR5 Ram kit that delivers the performance that Intel's latest 13th-generation processors demand at 5600MHz while not being too heavy on the wallet while being compatible with Intel's latest market standard for XMP (3.0)

The Crucial P5 Plus M.2 SSD delivers remarkably fast speed with a transfer rate of up to 6600MB/s and excellent data protection. This drive is designed specifically for intensive workloads, like gaming and creative applications.Although you will get the most performance using it with a Gen 4 slot, this drive is also backward compatible with Gen 3.0 slots.

The be quiet! Dark Base 900 is a full-tower case that is all about letting PC builders configure a rig exactly the way they want to. Large yet understated, the Dark Base 900 hushes the most powerful components and effectively disperses heat with 3 included Silent Wings 3 PWM fans. Motherboards are installable in multiple positions and the case allows the motherboard tray to serve as a test bench. Storage space will never be an issue with the Dark Base 900, since it can house up to 7 hard drives, 15 SSDs, and 2 optical drives.

COOLER MASTER MasterLiquid ML240L RGB V2 is a refreshed design from the popular MasterLiquid Lite Series that elevates the exterior design elements. The radiator surface area is larger to increase the surface area for heat dissipation for optimized cooling performance. In addition, the ML240L RGB V2 includes the latest SickleFlow 120 RGB fan with a brand-new design and Air Balance fan blades that are quieter than before without compromising on airflow and pressure.

So we have seen an Intel CPU paired with an NVIDIA GPU, but what happens when we go for an AMD CPU with an NVIDIA GPU? Despite the brand mixing, this build will perform excellently in any game, even in 4K resolution. For the CPU, we went with the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X, which runs at 5.7 GHz and is a whole lot cooler than Intel's 13th-generation CPUs. Despite that, we went for the Cooler Master Masterliquid cooler to handle heavy loads without thermal throttling.

For the GPU, we went for the Gigabyte Aorus GeForce RTX 4080 Master; this card is a workhorse, even if you use it for gaming. The cooler on the Aorus version is a significant upgrade from the founders' edition, but this GPU still needs a lot of cooling. To help with that, we went for the be quiet! Dark Base 900 case. This case has excellent airflow, and if you are looking to put more fans in this case, be quiet! makes excellent case fans.

Best PC Cases

The MSI Pro X670P is a capable middle-of-the-road X670 chipset-based workhorse coupled with support for high DDR5 OC clocks, EXPO support, Wifi and Ethernet 2.5G in tow

The XFX Radeon RX 7900XT is based on AMD's latest and most powerful graphics chips. The AMD RX 7900 XT is powered by the new RDNA 3 architecture, which delivers AI acceleration, a new AMD Radiance display engine, and a Chiplet design. There's also an improved 2nd generation of ray-tracing and AMD Infinity Cache features.This specific XFX GPU features 20 gigabytes of graphics memory on a 320-bit memory interface, a clock speed of 2400 MHz, and a powerful triple fan cooling solution.

The Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic Razer Edition PC Case is an ATX mid-tower case that perfectly combines style and function. Lian Li has customized its incredibly popular PC-O11 Dynamic Case to please fans of Razer gaming peripherals. The case features a dual chamber chassis design and front and side tempered glass for a modern sleep look. The Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic Razer Edition fully supports the Razer Synapse 3 RGB ecosystem to sync up case lights with Razer keyboards, mice, and headsets.

For the final build for this list, we went all AMD. For the CPU, we went with the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X again. At this price point, you cannot beat this CPU. And for the GPU, we went with the XFX Radeon RX 7900XT. This GPU offers similar performance to the RTX 4080 for significantly less. Of course, you won't get NVIDIA features like Ray-Tracing or DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling), but the in-game performance is pretty comparable.

We stuck with the same water cooler for this build as the last one, but for the case, we went with the LIAN LI PC-O11. This case has excellent airflow, is incredibly roomy to build in and has a fairly unique look to it. You will need a fan to pair here, and there are plenty of available options that should keep this build under $3,000. For the storage, we went with a 2 TB Crucial P5 NVME SSD. As far as M.2 SSDs go, you can not go wrong with the Crucial P5 lineup. 2 TB is an excellent amount of space and will give you more than enough room for an extensive game library.

While you certainly can build a gaming PC for $300, you will have to be thrifty with the components. Keep an eye out on sites like Craigslist and Facebook marketplace for used deals, but be aware of mining GPUs though.

That all depends on what kind of games you want to play and what resolution you are looking to play at. For 1080p, we recommend budgeting around $500 to $1,000. For 1440p, we recommend $1,000 to $2,000; for 4K, we look to spend over $2,000.

Marc Storch is a tech writer currently based in Denver, Colorado. His experience includes extensive work training senior citizens in the ever-changing world of technology. He is passionate about making tech accessible to all and being excellent to each other. Outside of writing about tech and video games, Marc has a background in video editing and broadcasting. When not writing or playing games with his friends (He is currently on a break from Breath Of The Wild due to a misunderstanding over mushroom-to-diamond exchange rates), Marc enjoys being a camera operator and broadcast tech for an indie wrestling league and traveling with his partner all over the world. Marc feels it is vitally important for readers to note that all his work is carefully proofread by his black cat Rue who has very strong opinions and will only accept payments in the form of cheese.

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