AMD has traditionally lagged behind Nvidia relating to ray tracing in video games, however in response to the most recent leak, AMD ray tracing is about to fully change with the launch of its RDNA 4 structure, which is predicted to launch later in 2024. These GPUs will nonetheless be up in opposition to some stiff competitors, although, as Nvidia is predicted to launch its next-gen Blackwell GPUs in the identical timeframe.
The most recent AMD GPUs, can deal with ray tracing to a sure diploma, and a few of them have landed on our greatest graphics card information, due to some aggressive pricing. Nevertheless, there’s no query that Nvidia nonetheless has the higher hand relating to rendering ray traced results similar to reflections and shadows. Might that every one be about to alter?
In a put up on X (previously Twitter), tech leaker Kepler_L2 claimed that the ray tracing engine on AMD’s new RDNA 4 GPUs “appears to be like model new.” In a follow-up put up, Kepler_L2 then clarified that “RDNA3 RT was primarily based on RDNA2 with some enhancements. RDNA4 RT appears to be like fully completely different.”
AMD has been taking part in a recreation of catch-up with Nvidia relating to ray tracing. Not solely did Nvidia get its first GeForce RTX 20 collection GPUs out the doorways whereas AMD was nonetheless caught on its ageing Graphics Core Subsequent structure, however AMD’s first-gen RDNA GPUs, such because the Radeon RX 5700 XT, didn’t have any ray tracing help both.
In our personal exams, we’ve discovered that the ray tracing efficiency of present AMD RDNA 3 GPUs is roughly corresponding to that of Nvidia’s last-gen Ampere graphics playing cards. RDNA 3 positively improved on RDNA 2 relating to ray tracing, for instance by transferring among the {hardware} bounding quantity hierarchy (BVH) sorting and traversal work from the GPU shaders to the RT cores, however Nvidia’s Ada GPUs are nonetheless a lot faster at ray tracing.
After all, ray tracing isn’t the one space the place AMD must meet up with Nvidia. AMD remains to be leaving the matrix AI cores in its GPUs unused in video games, and in our personal exams, Nvidia DLSS Tremendous Decision tech appears to be like considerably higher than AMD’s FSR. What’s extra, Nvidia’s DLSS Body Technology tech is rather more extensively supported than FSR’s equal.
If AMD can nail ray tracing and AI, although, its GPUs are in any other case lots quick sufficient relating to uncooked shader energy, and it appears to be like as if there are some very attention-grabbing occasions forward within the PC gaming GPU market. Within the meantime, if you happen to’re seeking to get a brand new graphics card, try our GeForce RTX 4070 Tremendous evaluation, the place we benchmark Nvidia’s newest mid-range GPU.
