AMD’s new RX 6700 XT graphics card is here,
but how does it compare against the next level up, the 6800, and which is worth getting?
I’ve compared both in 10 games at 1080p, 1440p, and 4K resolutions to show you the differences.
Here’s what we’re looking at when it comes to spec differences between these two graphics cards.
The 6800 has more memory, the memory is faster, it uses more power, it’s got 50% more compute units,
more stream processors, but it’s clock speeds aren’t as high the 6700 XT. Makes sense,
the 6800 is a higher tier card, so we expect it to be better in most aspects.
This is the system that I’m using to test both graphics cards in,
so overclocked i9-10900K and 32 gigs of memory are the key specs,
and both cards were tested with the same drivers and Windows updates.
Just before we get into the game benchmarks, you need to see that despite both being 2
slot cards of a very similar size, my 6800 weighs 500g or 1.1lb more than the 6700 XT,
so it’s got more metal for cooling, plus it’s also got a third Team Rocket fan.
This results in the 6800 being the cooler graphics card with a game running for at
least half an hour, and this was with the fans in both cards running at the same speed,
granted even the higher temp here isn’t anything I’d be worried about.
The 6700 XT was hitting higher clock speed in this game,
which is expected based on what we saw when comparing the specs just before.
The 6800 is also running cooler despite the system with it installed pulling more power
from the wall. In this specific game at 4K, the 6800 is using 7% more wattage,
however as you’ll see shortly, in Control the 6800 is also reaching 27%
higher average FPS, and this results in the 6800 offering better performance per watt
as it’s able to reach higher frame rates relative to the extra power that it uses.
Alright so with that in mind let’s get straight into the gaming benchmarks with 10 games at 3
resolutions, then afterwards we’ll look at things like pricing & availability, content creator
workloads and more - or you can use the timestamps below to time travel to a relevant section.
Red Dead Redemption 2 was tested using the games benchmark. I’ve got the 1080p results down the
bottom, 1440p results in the middle, and 4K up the top. At 1080p the 6800 was reaching
just 11% higher average FPS compared to the newer 6700 XT, which is actually one of the
smaller differences out of the games covered. This increases to a 19% lead at 1440p though
because generally higher resolutions are able to take better advantage of the GPU, while 4K
is now 23% faster on the 6800, though the 6700 XT wasn’t too far behind 60 FPS with the high preset.
Cyberpunk 2077 was tested in little China with the street kid life path. Despite these new RX
6000 series GPUs having ray tracing support, this isn’t currently a game that’s supported so I’ve
only been able to test without ray tracing. The 6800 was doing better in this game, its 1% lows
were above even the average FPS of the 6700 XT at 4K and 1440p resolutions, and close to it at
1080p. In terms of average FPS, the 6800 was 22% higher at 1080p and 25% higher at 1440p, decent
gains, but it does also cost more. We’ll look at cost per frame a bit later to compare value.
Control was tested with and without ray tracing, let’s start with ray tracing off results.
This game seems to be fairly GPU heavy, which seems to explain why it saw one of the largest
differences out of all 10 titles tested. The 6800 was reaching 27% higher average FPS at 1080p,
and then even better at higher resolutions. To be fair, the 6700 XT was still more than playable
even with max settings 1440p, so it depends what level of performance you’re targeting.
Performance dips down with ray tracing enabled. Unlike Nvidia, there’s no DLSS support here,
so we’re not able to boost performance. That said both were playing quite well at 1080p, and
remember I am using max settings here, you can of course use lower settings for higher resolutions,
but this is a GPU comparison so I’m generally sticking to higher presets.
With ray tracing on, the 6800 was 30% ahead of the 6700 XT at 1440p, and 28% higher at 1080p.
Microsoft Flight Simulator was tested in the Sydney landing challenge. This game saw
the smallest difference out of all 10 titles at 1080p, but the largest difference at 4K,
where the 6800 was reaching 37% higher average frame rate. The 6800 was 12%
ahead at 1440p, one of the smallest changes at this resolution,
though still nowhere near as minor of a difference compared to the 1080p results.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla was tested with the game's benchmark, and saw the smallest
differences between these two graphics cards out of all games covered at both 1440p and 4K.
It was only beaten by flight simulator for smallest difference at 1080p, so not too much
to gain with the higher tier 6800 here, at least when compared to the other games we’re looking at.
Watch Dogs Legion was also tested with the games benchmark. The gap between the two GPUs was a
little larger here, however still below the average of the 10 games covered. The 6700 XT
is still able to surpass 60 FPS with the highest ultra setting preset in this test,
while the 6800 was reaching 17% higher average FPS.
Fortnite was tested with the replay feature using the same replay file with both cards.
This was a more middle of the pack result and close to the average of the 10 games tested.
The 6700 XT was just below that sweet sweet 60 FPS with the highest epic setting preset at 4K,
though again you could of course lower settings to boost this significantly.
Over 100 FPS was achieved at 1440p max settings, where the 6800 was able to offer 23% higher
average frame rate. The boost to 1% lows is also much higher at 1440p and 4K compared to 1080p.
Battlefield V was tested in campaign mode. 1% lows from the 6800 were ahead of even
the average FPS of the 6700 XT at all resolutions by a fair amount,
though it’s not like the 6700 XT is offering poor performance.
Even at 4K max settings its 1% low is above 60 FPS, but this is an older game compared to
most of the others previously covered so I suppose that’s expected with newer hardware at this level.
Second last game before the big comparison. Shadow of the Tomb Raider was tested with
the game's benchmark. Not quite 60 FPS with max settings at 4K in this test,
the 6800 was reaching 23% higher average FPS here, still 22% higher at 1440p,
and then just 13% higher at the lower 1080p resolution.
The Witcher 3 is a game I’ve been testing the same way for about 5 years now,
so it’s a good one if you want to compare with my older videos. Anyway this was another where
1% lows from the 6800 could beat even the average FPS from the 6700 XT regardless of resolution,
but the 6700 XT is still running just fine even at 4K max settings in any case.
These are the differences in all 10 games tested between the RX 6800
and the RX 6700 XT at 1080p. The 6800 was around 17% faster on average in these games,
though some games like flight simulator down the bottom saw much smaller differences,
while GPU heavy games like control were up top and just shy of performing 30% better with the 6800.
Stepping up to 1440p and the 6800 was now almost 22% better on average. We’re expecting the
difference between the two graphics cards to widen at higher resolutions as this is more demanding on
the GPU. Even the games that saw the smallest improvement are now reaching 12% higher average
FPS with the 6800, a fair bit higher than the small 2% boost we saw in the worst case at 1080p.
This continues on at 4K, where the 6800 was now 27%
faster than the 6700 XT on average in these 10 games. Now even worst case we’re looking
at close to a 20% boost minimum, and Microsoft flight simulator which saw
the smallest difference at 1080p now sees the biggest difference at this resolution.
I’ve also tested some content creator workloads to get an
idea of what the difference is outside of gaming.
I’ve tested DaVinci Resolve with the Puget Systems benchmark. This test
generally seems to be fairly GPU heavy, so the 6800 is able to score 20% higher than the 6700 XT.
Adobe Premiere was also tested with the puget systems benchmark, however the GPU seems to
be less of a factor here, which is why the 6800 was now scoring less than 9% higher.
Blender was tested with the Open Data Benchmark with the BMW and Classroom
tests using OpenCL. This one is definitely more GPU dependent,
and the 6800 was completing the longer Classroom test 27% faster than the 6700 XT.
SPECviewperf tests out a bunch of professional 3D workloads. The 6800 was ahead for the most part,
however the margins could vary quite a bit depending on the specific test.
Now let’s discuss pricing, you can find updated prices linked in the description,
of course assuming there’s actually stock available, which has been a big issue lately.
The 6700 XT is meant to launch with a $480 USD MSRP,
and AMD do seem confident in their ability to have supply at launch,
but this wouldn’t be the first time that we’ve heard that from them. Unfortunately I’m making
this video before the launch so I haven’t had a chance to see what actual prices will be like.
Anyway the 6800 on the other hand launched $100 higher at $580 USD.
However on Newegg at the moment the lower prices are closer to $700 and these aren’t even in stock.
When making the cost per frame graph I’ve included the more realistic price of the 6800 in the red
bar, assuming MSRP in the purple bars though, the 6800 actually offers better value in terms of
1440p and 4K The 6700 XT offers slightly better value at 1080p, but it’s a narrow difference,
and the actual price after launch will probably be higher which would change this.
It of course comes down to what your budget is and what level of performance you’re targeting,
but assuming both were available at MSRP,
I think the extra price for the 6800 is worth it relative to the extra performance on offer.
It’s also worth noting that in this video I tested with resizable BAR disabled. The
reason will be clear in tomorrow’s 6700 XT vs RTX 3070 comparison,
but even if I test this on both cards, it’s a feature that they both have, so I wouldn’t
expect this to change the conclusion. So yeah - in addition to comparing the 6700 XT against
the Nvidia RTX 3070 I’ll also be comparing it against the RX 5700 XT from last generation,
so make sure you’re subscribed for all of those upcoming GPU comparisons. For now though, you can
check out some of my other GPU comparisons over here, so I’ll see you over in one of those next.