Gameplay Performance – Ray Tracing
In the gaming performance below, we are comparing performance at 1440p with Ray Tracing enabled in games, as this is the prime target resolution for these graphics cards. There are a couple of games where we had to drop to 1080p with Ray Tracing due to performance. We are using a GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER FE, GeForce RTX 4070 FE, and AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT for comparison, these are stock-clocked, reference-clocked GPU cards.
Alan Wake 2
In Alan Wake 2, we are running at 1440p with the “High” quality Ray Tracing preset enabled, not the new Ultra quality; this is one setting down, High. Even at “High” RT preset, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE cannot provide a playable experience at all without the help of DLSS Upscaling. In fact, even with DLSS Quality Upscaling, gameplay performance is on the border of being playable in this game. You will probably want to enable Balanced DLSS Upscaling in order to make the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE playable with just “High” Ray Tracing in this game at 1440p.
In terms of performance, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE sees a regression in RT performance compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER FE. In our testing, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is 8% slower than the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER FE with RT enabled in this game. Compared to the GeForce RTX 4070, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is only 10% faster.
Black Myth: Wukong
In Black Myth: Wukong we did have to drop this game to 1080p just to get a benchmark run done due to the tremendous burden on performance when the “Very High” RT option is enabled in this game. At 1080p the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE cannot provide a playable experience without DLSS Upscaling. We must enable DLSS Upscaling to even get 60 FPS average in this game, at 1080p, with Very High RT.
We are also not seeing an uplift in Ray Tracing performance for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE in this game either. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is on par with the performance of the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER when Ray Tracing is enabled, they are 1 FPS apart, or 3% at framerates this low. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is 19% faster than the GeForce RTX 4070.
Cyberpunk 2077
In Cyberpunk 2077, we are running at 1440p with the “Ultra” Ray Tracing feature enabled; this is not Path Tracing. We can see that the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE cannot deliver a playable experience at 1440p with Ultra Ray Tracing without Upscaling. We do need to enable DLSS Upscaling, which then provides a playable experience into the 70’s FPS average range.
This is yet another game where the Ray Tracing performance on the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is not impressive and performs similarly to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is just a 1.3% difference compared to the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER in Ray Tracing performance. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is 17% faster than the GeForce RTX 4070 and 63% faster than the Radeon RX 7800 XT.
Dying Light 2
In Dying Light 2, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE does provide a playable experience above 60 FPS average with High Ray Tracing enabled at 1440p. Turning on DLSS further improves that to above 100 FPS, so at least for this game, Ray Tracing is very playable at 1440p on the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE.
We are actually seeing a performance improvement over the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER with Ray Tracing, but it is small at just a 6% performance uplift. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is 25% faster than the GeForce RTX 4070 and 54% faster than the Radeon RX 7800 XT.
F1 24
In F1 24 the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE does provide a playable experience at 1440p and the highest Ray Tracing at 91 FPS without needing Upscaling. With DLSS, Upscaling performance jumps to well over 100 FPS. In terms of performance, though, we see another regression in Ray Tracing performance. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE ends up being 7% slower than the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is only 8% faster than the GeForce RTX 4070 and 17% faster than the Radeon RX 7800 XT.
Star Wars Outlaws
Star Wars Outlaws was the other game that was very demanding with Ultra Ray Tracing, we did have to drop the game to 1080p to get a benchmark run in. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE does not provide a playable experience even at 1080p with Ray Tracing, we do need to use DLSS Upscaling to get 70 FPS average to make it playable. This is yet another game that also had a Ray Tracing regression with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is 7% slower than the GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 FE is only 10% faster than the GeForce RTX 4070 and 60% faster than the Raadeon RX 7800 XT.