The Nvidia GTX 1070 and GTX 1080 are both fairly powerful gaming graphics cards, but
which should you pick, and is it worth upgrading? In this video we’ll check out a heap of
game benchmarks at 4K, 1440p, and 1080p to help you see the performance difference between
them.
I recently retested both the Nvidia GTX 1070 and 1080 graphics cards to compare against
the 2070 in previous videos, but figured it would also be worthwhile doing an updated
comparison between the 1070 and 1080 to see how they’re going going into 2019.
Let’s quickly take a look at how the 1070 and 1080 actually differ in terms of specs,
note that things like clock speed and power will vary between specific cards, these are
just the reference specs for each model. Important differences to take note of are that the 1080
has more cuda cores, higher base and boost clock speeds, and more and faster memory,
so an improvement in most aspects.
For the testing I’m using the EVGA 1080 FTW2 and the Galax 1070 EC, both come overclocked
out of the box, so expect different results with different cards, although I’ve only
seen differences of a few FPS myself.
The system that I’m testing with has an AMD Ryzen 2700X CPU in an MSI X470 Gaming
Pro Carbon motherboard running at stock speeds, along with 16GB of T-Force Night Hawk CL16
memory from Team Group running at DDR4-3200 in dual channel. Check the links in the description
for details on all of the components as well as for up to date pricing. The same Windows
version and Nvidia drivers were used for the testing, and with all games I’ve only tested
at max settings, as for most titles these should be more GPU bound and help us see the
differences, so with that in mind let’s get into the results.
Fortnite was tested with the same replay file at epic settings, and this game saw one of
the biggest performance improvements going from 1070 to 1080 graphics. At 4K and 1440p
the 1% low result from the 1080 was even above the average frame rate of the 1070. With a
1080p resolution the average frame rate with the GTX 1080 was 31% better than the 1070,
and then just a little lower at 1440p and 4K in this test.
Overwatch was tested in the practice range so that I can easily repeat the same test
run, and there was less of a difference between the two in this game, although the 1% low
from the 1080 was still ahead of the 1070’s average frame rate at 4K and 1440p, but realistically
still perfectly playable on either card at 1440p and epic settings. At 1080p there was
a 20% improvement to average FPS with the GTX 1080, a 24% improvement at 1440p, and
then a 28% improvement at 4K.
Battlefield 5 was tested in campaign mode rather than multiplayer, as it’s easier
to consistently reproduce the test run, and even at max settings I found either card could
play the game well at 1440p or below. With a 1080p resolution the GTX 1080 was getting
average frame rates 20% higher than the 1070, 22% higher at 1440p, and then 31% better at
4K.
CS:GO was tested with the ulletical benchmark, and there was less of a difference between
the 1080 and 1070 in this game, and this game saw the lowest increase with the 1080 out
of all games tested. There was far less of a change between the 1% low results at all
3 resolutions, and then in terms of average frame rates there was just a 9% improvement
at 1080p, 8% improvement at 1440p, and 11% improvement at 4K.
Rainbow Six Siege was tested with the built in benchmark, and the improvements here were
also on the lower side compared to most of the other games tested, although even at max
settings and with a 4K resolution the 1070 was still able to average above 60 FPS in
this test. At 1080p the GTX 1080 was averaging 18% higher than the 1070, 22% better at 1440p,
and 25% better at 4K.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider was also tested with the built in benchmark, and some nice
improvements are seen here with the 1080, this game saw the largest percentage improvement
at 1440p and 4K out of all games tested. At 1080p the GTX 1080 was getting 26% better
average frame rates than the GTX 1070, 31% better at 1440p and 32% better at 4K.
Far Cry 5 was tested with the built in benchmark, and both were able to get above 60 FPS at
1440p or below in this test with max settings. There wasn’t as big of a difference with
this game compared to others, the 1080 was performing 9% better at 1080p, 23% better
at 1440p, and 27% better at 4K.
Assassin’s Creed Odyssey was tested with the built in benchmark, and this game saw
lower improvements with the GTX 1080 compared to most of the other games that were tested.
The frame rates at ultra high settings aren’t that great as this doesn’t seem to be a
very well optimized game, although at the same time I don’t think it needs a high
frame rate to play. At 1080p there was a 16% improvement with the GTX 1080 over the 1070
in average frame rate, a 20% improvement at 1440p, and a 24% improvement at 4K.
PUBG was tested using the same replay, and at 1440p even with ultra settings the 1070
was almost able to average 60 FPS in this test, though of course expect much better
with lower settings. With a 1080p resolution the GTX 1080 was scoring 24% higher than the
1070 in average FPS, and then almost 29% better at both 1440p and 4K.
Watch Dogs 2 is a fairly resource intensive game, but I can play it perfectly fine with
a solid 30 FPS average, so 4K with the 1080 even maxed out actually mostly went ok for
me, and then perfectly fine with either card at any other resolution and settings. At 1080p
the GTX 1080 was giving us average frame rates 16% higher than the 1070, 20% higher at 1440p,
and 28% higher at 4K.
The Witcher 3 was tested with Hairworks disabled, but ultra settings are still pretty intensive
compared to the other settings in this game. Despite this though even at 1440p both graphics
cards were able to average above 60 FPS at ultra settings. With a 1080p resolution the
GTX 1080 was getting average frame rates 30% higher than the 1070, 28% higher at 1440p,
and 27% higher at 4K, so one of the only games to lower the gap at higher resolutions.
Shadow of War was tested with the built in benchmark at ultra settings, and once again
there were some fair improvements seen with the 1080 graphics. There was a 24% improvement
at 1080p, 25% better at 1440p, and then 28% better at 4K.
In terms of overall improvement, over all of the games tested at max settings with a
1080p resolution on average the 1080 is performing 20% better than the 1070, although we can
see there is quite a big difference between the various games.
At 1440p on average over the same games the 1080 was now performing 23% better than the
1070, but again it really varies depending on the specific game. On average we expect
the performance gap to widen at higher resolutions because higher resolutions are more GPU bound.
Finally at 4K the 1080 was now on average 26% better than the 1070 in these games, but
again this really varies based on the specific game, and we’re seeing the biggest difference
here as 4K gaming is much less CPU dependent.
It’s worth noting that the newer 20 series did introduce newer features like ray tracing
and DLSS, however at the time of recording both features are pretty scarce in games,
but this should in theory change over time and hopefully the technologies see further
improvements, as at the moment both still feel like they should be in BETA.
I haven’t tested overclocking here, as results aren’t guaranteed and will vary between
hardware based on what overclocks you can get, although as both are pre overclocked
cards we’ll likely only see a small difference of a few FPS.
Now for the final difference, the price. I suggest checking updated prices using the
links in the description, as prices will change over time. At the time of recording new 1080’s
seem to be going for around $500 to $550 USD on Amazon, while the 1070 is around the $400
price point, but you’ve also got the option of paying even less with the second hand market,
and of course prices will vary between region.
You can do your own math based on the prices you find, but if we’re going from a $400
GTX 1070 to $500 1080 that’s 25% more money for the GTX 1080, which seems reasonable when
considering we saw a 23% improvement on average at 1440p.
So which graphics card would you pick, the 1070 or 1080? When it comes down to it I think
either card is still capable of giving you a great gaming experience going into 2019.
If you’ve already got a 1070 I don’t think there’s that much benefit in upgrading to
a 1080 today, it still gives decent FPS in most games, up to you if you want more of
course, if you sell the 1070 there’s not too much of a price difference for some fair
gains. If you’re buying today, realistically neither are 4K cards, but both are able to
give good 1440p performance, even with max settings tested here, you could of course
get even higher frame rates at lower settings. If I was buying today I’d probably go the
1080, which is pretty much what I did around a year ago when I bought it new, I only got
the 1070 second hand just for benchmarking.
Let me know which card you’d pick down in the comments, and don’t forget to subscribe
for more comparisons and tech videos like this one.