The AMD Radeon RX 6800 was originally a high-end graphics card, however, time has meant it has now become a purely 1440p value play. Taken into account with this in mind, this option can be considered one of the best budget graphics cards for the cash-strapped consumer wanting to play games without breaking the bank. Our full AMD Radeon RX 6800 review goes into exactly why.
AMD Radeon RX 6800 price
The AMD Radeon RX 6800 is still available now for around the $410 mark through retailers such as Amazon and Best Buy. It launched back in 2020. For reference, that’s around the same price as the RTX 3070 and that’s fitting considering it’s another 1440p targeting GPU for the mid-range market. In comparison to the most recent GPU generation, the RX 6800’s equivalent is the RX 7700 XT which is available around the $420 mark and is a little more powerful.
- GPU: Navi 21 XL
- Stream Processors: 3840
- VRAM: 16 GB
- Bandwidth: 512.0 GB/s
- Base Clock Speed: 1700 MHz
- Boost Clock Speed: 2105 MHz
The AMD Radeon RX 6800 may be a little long in the tooth but it still offers excellent performance in 1080p and 1440p even if ray tracing isn’t quite its biggest strength. Given the $400 price point, it could be worth it from a sheer value perspective.
- Excellent 1440p performance
- Good value for money
- Tons of VRAM
- Nvidia does better ray tracing
- Replaced by RX 7800 XT
AMD Radeon RX 6800 key specs
The AMD Radeon RX 6800 is built upon the Navi 21 die with a total of 3,840 Stream Processors and 16GB GDDR6 VRAM on a 256-bit memory bus. That’s around double the amount of VRAM of its competition, the RTX 3070 with 8GB VRAM. There are also 240 texture mapping units and 96 ROPs. However, more excitedly, there are 60 RT cores because this video card is capable of doing real-time ray tracing as Team Red finally caught up with Nvidia which had implemented the tech two years prior.
AMD Radeon RX 6800 design
RX 6800 fans
RX 6800 power connectors
Thickness of the RX 6800
Rear I/O of the RX 6800
RX 6800 from a distance
Backplate of the RX 6800
RX 6800 heatsink
RX 6800 branding
In terms of design, the AMD Radeon RX 6800 is built on the RDNA 2 architecture forged with TSMC’s 7nm process. It’s a dual-slot GPU with a 250W TDP and is powered by 2x PCIe power connectors. AMD’s Reference model measures in conservatively at 10.5 x 4.7 x 1.6 inches (LxWxH) You’ll need at least a 600W PSU to have enough overhead in your machine which is fairly conservative given the power potential here.
The AMD Radeon RX 6800 still performs well as a 1440p graphics card for gaming and creatives
In terms of how the card looks, our review unit is the XFX Radeon RX 6800 which looks near-identical to an AMD-made Reference model, particularly with the three angular fans sporting ‘R’ for Radeon with a sleek black and gray color scheme. Simply put, it’s a stunning GPU, particularly with its red accents, too.
AMD Radeon RX 6800 performance
Despite its age, the AMD Radeon RX 6800 still performs well as a 1440p graphics card for gaming and creatives, just that 4K is out of this GPU’s range as the testing by BGFG’s Sebastian Kozlowski. This is most evident in Cyberpunk 2077 which excels in 1080p, beating the RTX 3070, and above 60fps in 1440p also leading over its older Nvidia rival. Unfortunately, native 4K isn’t possible to a playable standard as the game clocks in less than 30fps.
Speaking to the synthetic performance, the RX 6800 is comparable to the RTX 4070 and beats the older RTX 3070 thanks to its 16GB VRAM. While no longer leading, it’s excellent value for money factoring in the $400 price tag. Ray tracing isn’t going to be its biggest strength, as evidenced by Port Royal, but the performance should be solid enough.
Conclusion
Factoring in the price point of the hardware, this Big Navi GPU gets a lot right even when compared to more adept offerings like the RX 6800 XT and RDNA 3 alternatives. It should be a sweeping upgrade for your PC over the likes of the RX 5700 XT even if it can’t quite compete with the Ampere architecture’s DLSS and ray tracing performance capabilities. For high-end frame rates you shouldn’t have any problems in 1080p or 1440p.
When paired with a fast Intel Core or AMD Ryzen CPU there shouldn’t be much in the way of a bottleneck thanks to a large memory bandwidth further bolstered by FidelityFX Super Resolution. As for how it compares to Nvidia’s RTX line, things aren’t quite as strong but for most people after rasterization, it works out well enough.
Alternatives to the RX 6800
Your closest possible alternative to the RX 6800 from AMD is the RX 7700 XT which is available for around $450 which is slightly more expensive. In contrast, the RTX 4070 Super is available for $599. If that’s a little out of your price range then the RTX 4060 Ti 16GB for $499 which is around $80 more than what you can pick the 6800 for.
- You want excellent value for money
- Tons of VRAM is a must
- You mainly game in 1440p
- You want to game in 4K
- Extensive ray tracing is important
Is the AMD Radeon RX 6800 worth it?
While AMD’s new RDNA 3 architecture has replaced what the RX 6800 can do, the once-leading RDNA 2 model still has a lot to offer even in 2024. You will just need to keep the resolutions lower than 4K to ensure maximum playability.
