NVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 feature 2

NVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 benchmarked in the 17 most demanding PC games


Yesterday, we shared our thoughts regarding the 10GB of GDDR6X memory that the RTX3080 is equipped with. And, today, it’s time to benchmark this GPU in the 17 most demanding PC games.

As said, the games we’ve benchmarked are the following ones.

  • Marvel’s Avengers
  • Cyberpunk 2077
  • Watch Dogs Legion
  • Crysis Remastered
  • Project CARS 3
  • Horizon Zero Dawn
  • Red Dead Redemption 2
  • Quantum Break
  • Borderlands 3
  • CONTROL
  • Kingdom Come Deliverance
  • Ghost Recon Wildlands
  • Anthem
  • Metro Exodus
  • Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
  • Immortals Fenyx Rising
  • Godfall

For our benchmarks, we used an Intel i9 9900K with 16GB of DDR4 at 3800Mhz. Naturally, we also used the latest version of Windows 10 64-bit, as well as the latest version of the GeForce drivers.

For both our 1440p and 4K benchmarks, we used the default Ultra settings. We also focused on pure rasterization (as we’ve already talked a lot about DLSS and Ray Tracing). We’ll be also comparing our RTX3080 with the RTX2080Ti. Do note, however, that we’ve slightly overclocked our RTX3080 (+90Mhz). Additionally, our RTX2080Ti has been overclocked (via the curve functionality of MSI Afterburner). Both of these GPUs were operating between 1.9Ghz and 2.0Ghz.

Back when NVIDIA released the RTX2080Ti, I described it as a great 1440p graphics card. And I can wholeheartedly say the same about the RTX3080. At 1440p, this GPU can run these extremely demanding PC games with more than 60fps.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 1440p benchmarks

At 4K/Ultra, things are not looking that great for the RTX3080. As we can clearly see, most of these games run below 60fps on the RTX3080 at 4K/Ultra. This could give you an idea of what you can expect from the next-gen only games that will release in 2021 or 2022. Also, and given these numbers, we can assume that the RTX3080 will require more power for gaming at 4K/Ultra in newer titles (and not more VRAM).

NVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 4K benchmarks

Now as we can see below, the performance improvement over the RTX2080Ti was not that great. What also surprised us was the very low improvements in minimum framerates (in some games). For instance, we only saw a 9-10% performance improvement in minimum framerates in Cyberpunk 2077. Similarly, Immortals Fenyx Rising saw a 10-15% performance improvement in minimum framerates. On the other hand, Godfall saw a 29-33% performance boost in minimum framerates.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 vs RTX2080Ti 1440p benchmarksNVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 vs RTX2080Ti 4K benchmarks

The games that saw the biggest improvements in average framerates were Borderlands 3, CONTROL, Red Dead Redemption 2 and Horizon Zero Dawn.

Here are also all the percentage differences between the RTX3080 and the RTX2080Ti.

percentage differences between RTX3080 and RTX2080Ti

In conclusion, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX3080 appears to be an amazing 1440p graphics card. For 4K/Ultra gaming, though, you’ll either need DLSS or highly-optimized PC games. Owners of OC’ed RTX2080Ti GPUs should also not worry about the RTX3080, as the performance difference between them is not that big.