AMD Radeon RX 9070: In-Depth Review

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 enters the market at a pivotal moment for graphics cards, coming right after Nvidia's latest generation release. Priced at $549, it directly competes with the underwhelming GeForce RTX 5070, and AMD is currently dominating this matchup, making the Radeon RX 9070 an attractive choice for 1440p gaming enthusiasts.

However, the decision isn't straightforward due to AMD's own pricing strategy. The Radeon RX 9070 is only $50 less than the superior Radeon RX 9070 XT. While the price difference might make mathematical sense—the 9070 is about 8% slower and 9% cheaper than the 9070 XT—it's hard to resist spending just a bit more for the enhanced performance of the XT model. Yet, when choosing between these two AMD offerings, Team Red's options remain strong.

Purchasing Guide

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 is set to launch on March 6, with a starting price of $549. Expect to see various models at higher price points. If you decide to purchase the 9070, my recommendation is to opt for one as close to the base price as possible, given its proximity in cost to the Radeon RX 9070 XT.

AMD Radeon RX 9070 – Photos

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Specs and Features

Like the Radeon RX 9070 XT, the RX 9070 leverages the new RDNA 4 graphics architecture. This technology significantly enhances performance, allowing the 9070 to outperform the previous generation's Radeon RX 7900 GRE by a wide margin, despite having 30% fewer compute units.

The Radeon RX 9070 features 56 Compute Units, each equipped with 64 Streaming Multiprocessors (SMs), resulting in 3,584 shaders in total. Each compute unit includes one Ray Accelerator and two AI Accelerators, summing up to 56 and 112, respectively. These enhancements make the card competitive in ray tracing and introduce AMD's FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) 4, marking the first time AI upscaling is available on AMD GPUs.

Similar to the 9070 XT, the RX 9070 comes with 16GB of GDDR6 VRAM on a 256-bit bus. While this memory setup is comparable to the 7900 GRE and suitable for 1440p gaming for years to come, the absence of the newer GDDR7, which Nvidia adopted, might have been a missed opportunity to justify a higher price.

AMD suggests a minimum 550W power supply for the RX 9070, with a power budget of 220W. My tests, however, showed a peak consumption of 249W, suggesting a 600W PSU for safety.

Notably, AMD is not releasing a reference design for the RX 9070, leaving the production to third-party board partners. I reviewed the Gigabyte Radeon RX 9070 Gaming OC 16G, a triple-slot card with a slight factory overclock.

FSR4

Since the rise of DLSS in 2018, AI upscaling has become a key way to boost performance while maintaining image quality. Previously an Nvidia-exclusive feature, FSR 4 now brings AI upscaling to AMD GPUs. This technology uses previous frames and in-game data to upscale lower resolution images to native resolution through an AI model, reducing artifacts like ghosting seen in FSR 3's Temporal upscaling.

However, FSR 4 incurs a slight performance hit compared to FSR 3. In Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 at 1440p on the Extreme preset, FSR 3 yields 165 fps, while FSR 4 drops to 159 fps. Similarly, in Monster Hunter Wilds at 4K with ray tracing, the RX 9070 achieves 81 fps with FSR 3, but drops to 76 fps with FSR 4.

The Adrenalin software allows users to toggle between FSR 3 and FSR 4, offering a choice between better image quality and slightly better performance. As a fan of single-player games, I opt for FSR 4, though FSR 3 might be preferable for fast-paced online games.

AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT & 9070 – Benchmarks

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Performance

Priced at $549, the AMD Radeon RX 9070 outperforms the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 in most scenarios, delivering an average 12% higher performance at 1440p and a 22% lead over the RX 7900 GRE, its predecessor also launched at $549 in 2024. This is particularly impressive given the 9070's 30% fewer cores.

My test unit was a factory overclocked Gigabyte Radeon RX 9070 Gaming OC, boasting a boost clock of 2,700MHz, which is about a 7% increase, translating to roughly a 4-5% performance boost.

All graphics cards were tested with their latest public drivers at the time of writing, with AMD and Nvidia providing review drivers for the Radeon RX 9070, 9070 XT, and GeForce RTX 5070.

In 3DMark, the RX 9070 shows promising potential. In the Speed Way test with ray tracing, it scores 5,828 points, very close to the RTX 5070's 5,845. In the Steel Nomad test without ray tracing, the 9070 significantly outperforms the RTX 5070, scoring 6,050 to 5,034—a 20% difference.

Test System

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D
• Motherboard: Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Hero
• RAM: 32GB G.Skill Trident Z5 Neo @ 6,000MHz
• SSD: 4TB Samsung 990 Pro
• CPU Cooler: Asus ROG Ryujin III 360

In Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, showcased at CES 2025, the RX 9070 achieves 165 fps at 1440p with FSR 3 set to Balanced, significantly ahead of the RTX 5070's 131 fps and the 7900 GRE's 143 fps.

Cyberpunk 2077, a game traditionally favoring Nvidia, sees the RX 9070 leading by 3% at 1440p with Ray Tracing Ultra, a notable achievement for AMD at the same price point.

In Metro Exodus, without upscaling, the RX 9070 secures an 11% performance lead over the RTX 5070, achieving 71 fps compared to 64 fps.

Red Dead Redemption 2 demonstrates the RX 9070's prowess with a 23% lead over the RTX 5070 at 1440p, hitting 142 fps to the RTX 5070's 115 fps.

Total War: Warhammer 3 shows a close race at 1440p, with the RX 9070 barely ahead at 135 fps compared to the RTX 5070's 134 fps.

In Assassin's Creed Mirage, the RX 9070 achieves 193 fps at 1440p with FSR set to Balanced, an 18% lead over the RTX 5070's 163 fps.

Black Myth Wukong, another Nvidia-favored title, results in a tie at 1440p, with the RX 9070 getting 67 fps and the RTX 5070 at 66 fps.

Forza Horizon 5 sees the RX 9070 averaging 185 fps at 1440p, outperforming the RTX 5070's 168 fps and the RX 7900 GRE's 152 fps.

The timely launch of the Radeon RX 9070 following the GeForce RTX 5070 works in AMD's favor. Both cards are priced at $549, but the Radeon RX 9070's superior performance across numerous tests, combined with its 16GB of VRAM, makes it a more future-proof and better value option than the RTX 5070, despite the latter's use of GDDR7 memory.