21score
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Overall rank

Radeon RX 480

4.3 · 252 votes
Best for 1080p esports gaming

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VRAM
8 GB
CUDA
2,304
FP32
5.834 TF
Bandwidth
224 GB/s
TDP
150W
Boost
1266 MHz
Strengths at a Glance

How it stacks up to the flagship

Each metric is shown as a percentage of the GeForce RTX 5090 D, the strongest card we track.

FP32 compute5.834 TFLOPS6%
vs RTX 5090 D: 104.8 TFLOPS
Memory bandwidth224 GB/s13%
vs RTX 5090 D: 1790 GB/s
VRAM capacity8 GB25%
vs RTX 5090 D: 32 GB
Shading units2,30411%
vs RTX 5090 D: 21,760
Power efficiency12/10021%
vs RTX 5090 D: 58/100
Synthetic Benchmarks

Estimated benchmark results

Each result is shown as a share of the RTX 5090 D's score in the same test.

3DMark Time Spy7,560pts
vs RTX 5090 D: 36,000 pts
3DMark Port Royal (RT)3,240pts
vs RTX 5090 D: 18,000 pts
Blender (samples/min)988spm
vs RTX 5090 D: 5,200 spm
Geekbench Compute38,400pts
vs RTX 5090 D: 240,000 pts

Performance breakdown

Gaming21
Ray tracing18
AI / Compute16
Creator / 3D19
Power efficiency12
Real-World Gaming

FPS Across Resolutions

1080p · Ultra preset1440p · Ultra preset4K · Ultra preset
Cyberpunk 2077avg 25 fps
1080p
47
1440p
20
4K
9
Counter-Strike 2avg 57 fps
1080p
112
1440p
42
4K
18
Fortniteavg 44 fps
1080p
77
1440p
38
4K
17
Battlefield 5avg 58 fps
1080p
85
1440p
56
4K
32
Far Cry 5avg 46 fps
1080p
66
1440p
47
4K
25
Valorantavg 167 fps
1080p
150
1440p
234
4K
116

Average FPS across all PC games

1080p
82fps
1440p
54fps
4K
39fps

Cost per frame

Launch MSRP ($229) ÷ average FPS — lower is better.

1080p
$3.15
1440p
$4.80
4K
$6.78
Community Feedback

What Owners Say

Owners love the solid 1080p performance and great value for the price. The usual gripes are the fan noise under load and the card running a bit warm.

Pros
  • Plays modern games at high settings
  • Great for 1080p and 1440p gaming
  • Handles VR without breaking a sweat
  • Aged well, still runs current titles
Cons
  • Needs more power than expected
  • Drivers were unstable at launch
  • Poor performance in newer games

Supported technologies

AV1 Encode

Full specifications

Graphics processor
Architecture
GCN 4.0
Process node
14 nm
Transistors
5.7 B
Compute Units
36
Release date
2016
Launch price
$229
Core configuration
CUDA Cores
2,304
TMUs
144
ROPs
32
L2 cache
2 MB
Memory
Size
8 GB
Type
GDDR5
Bus width
256-bit
Bandwidth
224 GB/s
Memory clock
8000 MHz
Clocks & throughput
Base clock
1120 MHz
Boost clock
1266 MHz
FP32 (float)
5.834 TFLOPS
FP16 (half)
5.834 TFLOPS
Pixel rate
41 GPixel/s
Texture rate
182.3 GTexel/s
Board & power
TDP
150W
Suggested PSU
300W
Power connectors
1x 6-pin
Bus interface
PCIe 3.0 x16
Length
240 mm
Slot width
2-slot
Display & outputs
Max resolution
7680×4320
Outputs
1x HDMI 2.0b, 3x DisplayPort 1.4a

API and SDK support

DirectX
DirectX® 12
Shader Model
6.7
OpenGL
4.5
OpenCL
2.0
Vulkan
+
Verdict

Our verdict on the RX 480

A solid 1080p card that made high-quality VR gaming affordable when it launched, but its age shows.

Get it if you need a cheap, used card for 1080p gaming and don't mind older drivers and features. Skip it if you want modern ray tracing or power efficiency, as newer GPUs are far better.

Buy it if…

  • You want a solid 1080p card for older games without breaking the bank.
  • You need a cheap upgrade for a system from the mid-2010s.
  • You run Linux and want reliable, open-source driver support.
4.3

252 votes

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