AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX vs. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 – Features, Specs, Price and Performance Comparison (Updated)

AMD announced its latest GPUs based on the new RDNA 3 architecture last month – the Radeon RX 7900 XTX 24G and Radeon RX 7900 XT 20G. Both graphics cards will be available starting December 13, 2022, with retail prices of $999 and $899, respectively. In this article, let’s briefly compare AMD’s latest RX 7900 series GPUs to NVIDIA’s RTX 4090 and RTX 4080. Both the RTX 4090 and RTX 4080 are already available; by this time, we already know the performance of NVIDIA’s latest GPUs. Based on the recent reviews, let’s compare their features, specs, prices, and performance.

UPDATE 2: Reviews for the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT are now live. We now know how fast AMD’s GPUs are. Check them below.

UPDATE: Just a minor update here. AMD confirmed that the Radeon RX 7900 XTX is not an RTX 4090 competitor. But the new Radeon GPUs will be an RTX 4080 competitor instead.

AMD Radeon RX 7000 vs. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 Series – Who Will Win?

AMD is implementing a new chiplet design, similar to what they are doing on their Ryzen processors. This time, the GCD or Graphics Compute Die sits between six Memory Cache Die (MCD) (three on each side). The GCD is a 5nm chip, while the MCDs are 6nm. This approach helped AMD to deliver up to 15% higher frequencies while achieving up to 54% better power efficiency.

Not only that, but this also helped AMD reduce the cost of its GPUs. Unlike NVIDIA’s RTX 40 series GPUs that use the more expensive TSMC 4N fab process, AMD was able to save some cost by using 5nm and 6nm chips.

GPU Core and Memory

As mentioned, NVIDIA’s RTX 4090 uses TSMC’s 4N, which is a custom 5nm fab process, with an AD102 GPU at its core. Although not directly comparable, the Radeon RX 7900 XTX has 12,288 streaming processors, while the RX 7900 XT has 10,752. Meanwhile, NVIDIA’s RTX 4090 has 16,384 CUDA cores, and the RTX 4080 will have 9,728 CUDA cores.

NVIDIA uses a much faster GDDR6X memory on the RTX 4090 and 4080. AMD is still using GDDR6 for both graphics cards. The RX 7900 XTX has the same memory size as the RTX 4090, which is 24GB. However, the RX 7900 XT has 20GB of memory capacity while the RTX 4080 only has 16GB, but it’s a faster GDDR6X memory.

When it comes to clock speed, unfortunately, there are no GPUs that reach 3GHz frequency in this generation. Maybe, we may see faster-clocked GPUs in the next generation.

See also: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 vs RTX 3090 Ti.

Connectors and Power Efficiency

Regarding power and efficiency, the Radeon RX 7900 XTX and XT have a total board power of 355W and 300W, respectively. Those numbers are lower than the RTX 4090’s and RTX 4080’s TGP. AMD didn’t jump into the 12VHPWR 16-pin PCIe power connector bandwagon that NVIDIA is currently using. Instead, they stick with the good-old 8-pin PCIe power connectors.

AMD looks more efficient on paper than NVIDIA’s RTX 40 series graphics cards. However, we’ll have to wait for 3rd party testing and review to validate this.

While AMD opted not to use the new 16-pin PCIe power connector, AMD opted for DisplayPort 2.1. This was actually one of AMD’s highlights during the presentation. NVIDIA’s RTX 40 series graphics card doesn’t use the faster DisplayPort 2.1 interface, only DP1.4a. The DisplayPort 2.1 should offer more bandwidth and will be helpful when the new 8K monitors are released next year.

However, I don’t think people will buy the RX 7900 XTX for 8K gaming. Most gamers today are still using 1080p or 1440p monitors. 4K isn’t even the “default” resolution used by gamers. Anyway, whether there is an advantage to having DisplayPort 2.1 connectivity on the graphics card or not remains to be seen once it’s out and the new monitors are released.

AMD Radeon RX 7900 Series vs. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090/4080 Specs Comparison

Check the latest pricing and availability: (#ad)
GeForce RTX 4090 graphics Cards are available on Amazon.com here.
Radeon RX 7900 XTX graphics cards check on Amazon.com here.

Gaming Performance – Reviews Are Out!

Finally, reviews are out, and we now know how fast the Radeon RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT are. In their presentation, AMD mentioned that the RX 7900 XTX is up to 1.7x faster than the RX 6950 XT at 4K. Unfortunately, most of the reviews suggest that the RX 7900 XTX is only up to around 40%-50% faster than its predecessor.

But most of you are probably more excited to see how the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT fare with NVIDIA’s latest RTX 4090 and RTX 4080. Well, based on LTT’s review, the RX 7900 XTX is just around 9% faster (on average) than the RTX 4080 in 4K gaming. This is for traditional rasterization only. And as expected, the RX 7900 XTX is slower than the RTX 4090 by around 17%. Still, those numbers are not bad considering the prices of these GPUs.

TechPowerUp’s review of the RX 7900 XTX shows a slightly different result. This time the RTX 4080 is closer to the RX 7900 XT’s performance. Nevertheless, the general consensus is RTX 4090 > RX 7900 XTX > RTX 4080 > RX 7900 XT. Again, this is in traditional rasterization only. Ray tracing performance is another story.

Source: TechPowerup’s AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX Review – Disrupting the RTX 4080

AMD’s Radeon RX 7000’s Ray Tracing Performance Is Still Not On Par With NVIDIA’s

Both the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT have better ray tracing performance than their predecessors. However, it is still not on par with NVIDIA’s GPUs. The RX 7900 XTX is slower than the RTX 4080 when ray tracing is enabled. And the performance difference gets even wider compared to NVIDIA’s flagship RTX 4090.

Source: LTT’s This video will not age well… – AMD Radeon RX 7900 Series Review

TL;DR – Radeon RX 7900 XTX vs RTX 4090

At the end of the day, both AMD’s Radeon RX 7900 XTX and NVIDIA’s RTX 4090 flagship GPUs have pros and cons. One thing is clear though, I think NVIDIA priced and positioned the RTX 4080 to make the RTX 4090 “look good”. The same can be said with the RX 7900 XTX and RX 7900 XT. The price difference is just $100, but the performance difference between the XTX and XT is somewhat significant. Their current pricing just makes the RX 7900 XT and RTX 4080 a “poor value” compared to the RX 7900 XTX and RTX 4090, respectively.

Also, I think AMD should have given the RX 7900 XT a different name. It’s very confusing and not consumer friendly – “XTX” and “XT“.

Buy the Radeon RX 7900 XTX If:

If you don’t care about ray tracing, DLSS, video encoding, and most games you play favor AMD GPUs, then the RX 7900 XTX is for you.

Buy the GeForce RTX 4090 If:

However, if you want the best of the best, regardless of price, the RTX 4090 is more powerful and offers a broader range of features and capabilities than AMD’s offering. You might want to check some of the best RTX 4090 graphics cards here.

Do Not Buy Either If:

If you are using a 1080p monitor only. Upgrade your monitor first; get at least a 1440p monitor, or get the best 4K gaming monitor available.

Check the latest pricing and availability: (#ad)
GeForce RTX 4090 graphics Cards are available on Amazon.com here.
Radeon RX 7900 XTX graphics cards check on Amazon.com here.