NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 vs AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT
Side-by-side benchmark comparison, specs, pricing, and value analysis.
Benchmark Comparison
Gaming figures are average frames per second, measured by Tom's Hardware GPU hierarchy. Geometric mean of 15 games, ultra settings, no upscaling. Ray tracing figures are DXR-enabled at 1440p. A dash means the card was not tested at that resolution. Productivity and Steel Nomad are synthetic scores on their own scales and are not comparable to the fps columns.
Specifications
| Spec | GeForce RTX 3090 | Radeon RX 9070 XT |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 24GB GDDR6X | 16GB GDDR6 |
| Memory Bandwidth | 936.2 GB/s | 640 GB/s |
| Shaders | 10496 | 4096 |
| Boost Clock | 1695 MHz | 2970 MHz |
| TDP | 350W | 304W |
| Architecture | Ampere | RDNA 4.0 |
| 3DMark Steel Nomad | 5,117 | 7,249 |
| Best Price | $1,499 | $599 |
| Value Score | 18/100 | 72/100 |
Verdict
The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is the clear winner — it offers both better performance and better value.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 vs AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT: Which Should You Buy?
This is not a close race. The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT delivers 129.9 fps at 1440p ultra to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090's 106 fps, a 23% gap. Only pick the slower card if it is dramatically cheaper or you need it for a lower resolution.
Pricing settles it: the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is both faster and 150% cheaper at $599 versus $1,499. There is no scenario in this pairing where the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 is the better buy at these prices.
Two things beyond raw speed: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 carries 24GB against 16GB — the deciding factor at 1440p and above with ray tracing or texture packs, and the reason 16GB cards age badly; and the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT draws 46W less (304W versus 350W), which can mean a smaller PSU and a quieter case; and the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is 5 years newer (2025 versus 2020), so it gets longer driver support and newer upscaling and frame generation features.