(Image credit: Future)
Check out more of the year’s best tech in our PC Gamer Hardware Awards 2024 coverage.
We’re almost there, folks: the next generation of graphics cards is just around the corner. Intel recently sprung the Arc B580 on us, but apart from that, it feels like an age since a new GPU launched. Actually, though, there were some other launches this year—it’s just that they all launched at the start of 2024, almost one whole year ago.
In January, Nvidia churned out its mid-gen RTX Super refresh in the form of the RTX 4070 Super, RTX 4070 Ti Super, and RTX 4080 Super. These offered some performance increases and price drops compared to their predecessors, with the 4070 Ti Super boasting the die of an RTX 4080, the RTX 4070 Super offering a bunch of extra shader cores, and the RTX 4080 Super dropping to a much more reasonable, but still rather expensive $1,000.
AMD had a couple GPUs up its sleeve, too, but these didn’t seem to put much of a dent in Nvidia’s market dominance. Especially, that is, considering the fact that the stellar RX 7900 GRE has been pretty consistently out of stock in most places in the West since its February 2024 regional launch.
There wasn’t much new in the budget end of the market, either, with the RTX 4070 Super, RTX 4070 Ti Super, RTX 4080 Super, and RX 7900 GRE all being high-end cards. On the cheaper end, we had the RX 7600 XT and the just-released Arc B580, neither of which have impressed us very much—although the B580 could have some promise if and when drivers improve.
Best graphics card 2024: the nominees
AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE
The RX 7900 GRE was a latecomer to the Western market, and unfortunately it hasn’t been widely available even after it hit the shelves, being more of a system-builder’s card than a DIY GPU for much of its retail life. But if you’ve been lucky enough to spot it in stock somewhere and pick it up, you’ll have got your hands on a fantastic value GPU. It costs about the same as an RTX 4070 Super, performs a little better on average, and has more VRAM to boot. It is, however, lacking the Nvidia card’s stellar ray tracing performance.
Read our Sapphire Nitro+ RX 7900 GRE review.
Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Ti Super
The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Ti Super was the only refreshed RTX 40-series graphics card to sport an entirely new GPU from its namesake. The RTX 4070 Ti Super has the AD103 GPU of the RTX 4080—though of course that’s a nerfed version of the die. Performance-wise it gets close to the RTX 4080 and RTX 4080 Super, and it does so for a fraction of the cost. It’s also one of the main cards to feature in tons of gaming PCs on offer this year. It’s been a real mainstay, and for good reason.
Read our MSI RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3X review.
Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super
The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super was the most impressive update to the RTX 40-series line-up, and that’s because it added a whopping 1,280 CUDA cores to the RTX 4070’s 5,888. This gave it RTX 3080 Ti-level performance for just $599. Its only real competitors in this bracket come from AMD, and most gamers weren’t willing to sacrifice Nvidia’s ecosystem and ray tracing performance. It also helps that the RTX 4070 Super is probably the cheapest graphics card to truly handle 1440p resolution today in most games, even at high refresh rates.
Read our Nvidia RTX 4070 Super review.
The winner of the Best Graphics Card 2024 PC Gamer Hardware Award will be announced on New Year’s Eve. So remember to check back to find out which GPU takes the crown.
