GeForce RTX 3080 vs. Radeon RX 6800 XT

Due to popular demand we're following upward to our comparison of the RTX 3070 and RX 6800 from a few weeks back. This latest GPU shootout sees the faster and more expensive GeForce RTX 3080 pitted against the Radeon RX 6800 XT. We take a long list of games to be tested roofing the 1080p, 1440p and 4K resolutions.

Simply before we go to that, a quick disclaimer: yep, we know availability for both graphics cards is terrible, peculiarly the Radeon which is nearly non-existent based on what we're hearing from retailers. The RTX Ampere GPUs are coming in slowly, but supply is nowhere almost it needs to be, so shortages will continue for the foreseeable. As nosotros reported last week, scalpers have been a major cistron in the equation unfortunately.

Still, in that location'south a gamble if you're patient plenty, yous'll eventually get your hands on one of these GPUs, and of course we're hoping availability improves before long. Whenever that time comes, this review will assist reply the question of which one should yous purchase?

For reference, hither are the GPU specs and suggested retail pricing for these cards.

	GeForce RTX 3080	Radeon RX 6800 XT
Price (MSRP)	$700	$650
Release Date	Sept. 2022	Nov. 2022
Process	Samsung 8N	TSMC N7
Transistors (billion)	28.3	26.8
Die Size (mm2)	628.4	519
Core Config	8704 / 272 / 96	4608 / 288 / 128
Core Clock Frequency	1440 / 1710 MHz	2015 / 2250 MHz
Memory Capacity	10 GB	16GB
Memory Speed	19 Gbps	16 Gbps
Retentiveness Type	GDDR6X	GDDR6
Motorbus Blazon / Bandwidth	320-bit / 760 GB/s	256-scrap / 512 GB/s
TGP	320 watt	300 watt

Since nosotros first tested the GPUs, nosotros've updated the our test rig, moving away from the Ryzen 9 3950X to the newer 5950X, though we're sticking with the DDR4-3200 CL14 dual-rank memory as information technology'southward quite a bit faster than even DDR4-3800 single rank. Nosotros have also disabled stuff like Smart Access Retention unless specified otherwise.

Representing the GeForce team is the RTX 3080 Founders Edition graphics card, while the Radeon GPU will be represented by AMD's ain reference card.

Both were tested at stock settings with no overclocking. As usual, of the thirty games we tested we've picked around one-half a dozen of the most interesting results before we jump into breakdown graphs to summarize all the data.

Benchmarks

Starting with Battlefield V we see that the Radeon GPUs have a pregnant performance advantage in this title, then much and then that the RX 6800 is able to beat the RTX 3080 at 1080p and 1440p.

At 1440p the 6800 XT is 20% faster than the RTX 3080, a massive performance departure considering they occupy a similar price point, or are at to the lowest degree are meant to.

The Ampere architecture does scale amend at 4K, or at to the lowest degree the higher core count parts like the RTX 3080 do. This isn't and then much a memory bandwidth issue for the RDNA ii GPUs every bit people often claim, rather it's a instance of the RTX 3080 and its underlying architecture coming to life at this higher resolution.

Whatever the reason, the fact remains that the RTX 3080 frequently performs improve at 4K and here we're seeing it come from 17% behind the 6800 XT at 1440p to 6% faster. Information technology's not a big difference in this title, merely the GeForce GPU shows information technology's the meliorate performer at 4K.

Hitman 2 is mostly CPU limited at 1080p, so we can skip those results and motility to 1440p.

Here the RTX 3080 and 6800 XT are evenly matched with the GeForce GPU winning past a slim half-dozen% margin. That departure is increased at 4K to just vii%, making the RTX 3080 slightly faster in Hitman 2.

Microsoft Flying Simulator 2022 is also CPU limited at the lower resolutions and pushing by 60 fps when flight over densely populated areas is very difficult.

The 6800 XT is just 3fps faster at 1080p on average. The RTX 3080 so pulls ahead at 1440p to win by a 5% margin and and then a more significant 11% at 4K assuasive the GeForce GPU to reach 40 fps which does make the game noticeably smoother.

Next up we have Borderlands iii and here the Radeon GPUs perform quite well. The 6800 XT is seven% faster than the 3080 at 1440p and eight% faster at 1080p, non massive margins past any means but a clear win for the 6800 XT. Once again though, every bit we accomplish 4K, the 3080 catches up and this time matches the 6800 XT with 66 fps.

As we know from recent benchmarks focusing on Cyberpunk 2077 performance, the GeForce GPUs accept a slight functioning advantage in this title everything being equal. Given this title was sponsored by Nvidia, the performance is acceptable overall on the Radeon side.

For example, the RTX 3080 was viii% faster at 1440p, but a much more substantial 18% at 4K. Plow on DLSS (nosotros have a dedicated article for that) and the GeForce delivers an entirely superior form of performance.

Command is another championship where Nvidia had shut involvement on optimizing it with ray tracing and DLSS. Without utilizing those features, the RTX 3080 is 13% faster at 1440p which is a large operation increase and as expected this margin just increased at 4K, blowing out to an 18% advantage in Nvidia's favor.

DLSS two.0 is a key gene for playing Command using an RTX GPU. For example, the RTX 3080 goes from a sixty fps boilerplate to 90 fps if you enable DLSS. Then using both ray tracing effects and DLSS gets you lot down to about the same sixty fps average with better graphics in this item championship and solid implementation of ray tracing.

Reddish Dead Redemption 2 sees the GPUs matching each other's performance at 1080p and 1440p. And so at 4K, the RTX 3080 is able to pull ahead, beating the 6800 XT by a disarming 15% margin.

The Outer Worlds was built using Unreal Engine 4 which typically favors Nvidia hardware, so it comes every bit little surprise to meet the RTX 3080 pulling well ahead of the 6800 XT, even at 1080p.

At 1440p the GeForce was 15% faster and that margin blows out to a whopping 21% at 4K giving Nvidia a meaning functioning advantage in this game.

There are plenty of new AMD sponsored games every bit well. Such is the instance of Assassin's Creed Valhalla. AMD'due south investment has paid off equally the 6800 XT is a full 31% faster at 1080p, 21% faster at 1440p and 11% faster at 4K.

F1 2022 is an Nvidia Gameworks title simply it's always run well on AMD hardware. Here nosotros tin see the 6800 XT offers slightly more frames at 1080p and 1440p, though it'south a mere 6% advantage at 1440p. At 4K results are more evenly matched.

Monster Hunter Globe sees the RTX 3080 performing exceptionally well. Even at 1080p information technology was 10% faster than the 6800 XT, 11% faster at 1440p and 20% faster at 4K.

Last up are Doom Eternal results and while the margins hither are probably meaningless given nosotros're talking about well over 150 fps fifty-fifty at 4K, let's chop-chop go over the results anyway. The 6800 XT was barely any faster at 1080p with 412 fps on boilerplate. It's simply at 4K where the 3080 takes charge to win by an xi% margin.

30 Game Summary

So far the Radeon RX 6800 XT and GeForce RTX 3080 looked competitive at 1440p, while the GeForce appears more than dominant at 4K. Let's take a look at the total list of games nosotros tested to see how the GPUs compare overall.

Starting with the 1440p data, we encounter that these GPUs are indeed even at 1440p. At near the 6800 XT was upwards to twenty% faster, but nosotros also saw instances where it was xiii-17% slower. For half the games tested the margin was 5% or less, which we deem a draw. At that place were but 11 games out of 30 where the margin was 10% or greater in either management.

Things become more articulate cut at 4K. Hither the 6800 XT was on boilerplate six% slower and we're looking at simply a few titles where the Radeon GPU came out on height, most of which are AMD sponsored titles. This time there are 14 games where the 6800 XT was slower by a 10% margin or greater, making the RTX 3080 the superior choice for 4K gaming.

This is also in line with our findings in our day-1 reviews of both GPUs (tested with the R9 3950X). Fifty-fifty if the list of games were not the same (or the same quantity of titles), on boilerplate the conclusions we could depict from those results were the same.

What Nosotros Learned

All that testing afterward, we have a solid idea of how the Radeon RX 6800 XT and GeForce RTX 3080 compare across a huge number of games. Now the question is which one should you buy?... in one case availability improves.

Information technology'southward been ii months since the Radeon RX 6800 series launch and AMD assured us that in 4 to viii weeks information technology would be possible to purchase AIB cards at the suggested retail price: $580 for the RX 6800, and $650 for the RX 6800 XT.

Plainly that hasn't happened, and availability has get a bigger issue than pricing, even though cards are grossly overpriced and out of stock at about all times. Therefore it's time to call information technology: AMD has failed to deliver. We've heard there's virtually no supply of 6800 series GPUs coming in and the situation is worse than the one presented by Nvidia.

On the Nvidia side, at least there are RTX 3080 AIB models listed at the MSRP, even if they are out of stock. Whereas the 6800 XT's appear to be $200+ over the MSRP, at that place are a number of 3080's priced within $100 of the MSRP. And then supply and pricing on Nvidia'southward end appears to be better, though still a dire situation.

Frankly the 6800 XT isn't worth $850 and you lot admittedly shouldn't pay that much for i. Nosotros'd rather spend $150 on something similar a second mitt RX 570 and play some older games, or esports titles with lower quality visuals and wait it out.

That's the situation as of writing, but what virtually a future where both the RTX 3080 and 6800 XT are available at the MSRP, which is better value so?

If yous're into streaming and wish to use your GPU for all the heavy lifting, and so the RTX 3080 is the obvious choice, too. AMD offers but poor encoding support which is something they should have addressed by this point, especially if they want to charge elevation dollar for their GPUs.

The Radeon has the upperhand on VRAM buffer, though the RTX 3080 does very well at 4K right at present with 10 GB of retention and we don't see this being an issue any time presently.

In terms of cost per frame, both are like. Features similar ray tracing back up and DLSS can make the RTX 3080 more appealing to y'all, especially if the games y'all play utilise those features. In fact, if you care about ray tracing, the RTX 3080 is a much better pick.

Although we didn't spend much fourth dimension showing how the two GPUs compare in this regard, we have dedicated articles about this, and we're specially enthusiastic about DLSS ii.0 support coming to more games. As nosotros've noted in the past, the list of games that support ray tracing is slowly growing, but at that place are few games where the feature truly shines. Games such every bit Control, Sentry Dogs Legion, Cyberpunk 2077 and Minecraft are the best showcases, whereas a Fortnite-style game, Call of Duty and Battlefield Five, are not as well suited to it given their fast paced gameplay and need for acme FPS.

You will almost always desire to enable DLSS 2.0 in whatsoever game that supports information technology though. This is something yous'd likely enable in Fortnite, for instance. How useful DLSS is both game and resolution dependent. Typically we see reviewers evaluating DLSS in games similar Cyberpunk 2077 using an RTX 3080 at 4K, and this is past far the best style to showcase the technology. As you lower the resolution, even to 1440p, the image becomes slightly blurry as DLSS has less data to work with and at 1080p, fifty-fifty in Cyberpunk 2077, the quality DLSS selection isn't great and in our option noticeably worse than native 1080p.

With that said, we consider DLSS is a strong selling point of RTX Ampere GPUs and it's something AMD volition demand to counter sooner rather than later.

As for Smart Access Retentiveness, which right now is only enabled by AMD on Zen 3 setups -- we've defended an article to it besides. The consensus appears to be that until the technology is universally supported and enabled by default, we shouldn't exam with information technology. Although SAM can exist enabled for all games, only some encounter a noteworthy performance uplift, others little or even a slight pass up. With SAM enabled, the 6800 XT average performance is only improved by 3%.

TL;DR: The RTX 3080 and RX 6800 XT are evenly matched, but overall the GeForce RTX 3080 has the upperhand in this battle. New technologies such equally ray tracing and DLSS make it harder than always to make a concise GPU recommendation, but hopefully our thorough testing can help you narrow down your choice between the two.