Radeon RX 6800 and RX 6800 XT benchmarks: AMD successfully returns to high-end gaming GPUs

Yesterday, AMD lifted its review embargo on the new Radeon RX 6800 and 6800 XT graphics cards, and our colleagues at TechPowerUp were among the first to publish their review of the new GPUs:

In its marketing materials, AMD positions the Radeon RX 6800 as a competitor to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, and the Radeon RX 6800 XT as a cheaper alternative to the GeForce RTX 3080. Spoiler alert: the "red" giant wasn't exaggerating in its RDNA2 marketing campaign. The new architecture is a massive success.

TechPowerUp's test bench featured an Intel Core i9-9900K overclocked to 5.0 GHz, 16 GB of Thermaltake TOUGHRAM DDR4 memory running at 4000 MHz with 19-23-23-42 timings, and a 2 TB Crucial MX500 SSD.

The GPUs were tested in the following games at max settings:

• Assassin's Creed Odyssey

• Battlefield V

• Borderlands 3

• Civilization VI

• Control

• Death Stranding

• Detroit Become Human

• Devil May Cry 5

• Divinity Original Sin II

• DOOM Eternal

• F1 2020

• Far Cry 5

• Gears 5

• Hitman 2

• Metro Exodus

• Project Cars 3

• Red Dead Redemption 2

• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

• Shadow of the Tomb Raider

• Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order

• Strange Brigade

• The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Looking at the average performance across 22 games, it's clear that the RX 6800 handily beats both the RTX 3070 and the RTX 2080 Ti. This gap is too wide to be attributed to margin of error. What's more, NVIDIA's cards have been on the market longer and have already benefited from driver optimizations. Meanwhile, AMD's software isn't fully matured for the RX 6000 series yet, meaning the RX 6800's lead over the RTX 3070 could grow even further. On top of that, rumors have been circulating for a while that NVIDIA plans to counter with a more powerful RTX 3070 Ti (SUPER?).

Now, let's talk about the RX 6800 XT's performance:

This is where things get a bit more complicated than with the non-XT model. AMD's top-end GPU (albeit temporarily, given the upcoming RX 6900 XT) couldn't quite beat the RTX 3080, though it came incredibly close. Still, the RX 6800 XT is by no means a disappointment. It delivers excellent performance and costs less than the RTX 3080.

For a deeper dive into the RX 6800 XT and RX 6800 benchmarks, check out TechPowerUp's original review.

Ray tracing performance:

However, enabling ray tracing causes a significant performance hit on AMD's new cards. That said, TechPowerUp only tested NVIDIA-partnered titles like Control and Metro. In other games, such as Watch Dogs: Legion, the performance drop is less severe, and the gap to the competition isn't as wide.

Finally, a few words about the power consumption of AMD's new cards:

It might be hard to believe, especially after power-hungry beasts like the Radeon Vega and Radeon R9 390/290, but the RX 6800 and RX 6800 XT are incredibly power-efficient for this level of performance. In games, the RX 6800 draws just 215W, while its bigger sister stays under 285W. Compared to the RTX 3070's 242W and the RTX 3080's massive 348W, these results are impressive.

With such impressive performance and power efficiency, there's little doubt that the upcoming, true flagship Radeon RX 6900 XT can go toe-to-toe with, and perhaps even beat, the GeForce RTX 3090 currently sitting alone at the top.