AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT Review: RDNA 3 Power For Midrange Gaming

Unlocking affordable high-end gaming performance with AMD's latest RDNA 3 midrange GPU and impressive efficiency upgrades delivering smooth frame rates

Hardware by Katmin on Jun 13, 2025

The Radeon RX 7800 XT represents AMD's latest midrange offering in the RDNA 3 lineup. Like its predecessors, this GPU is designed for gamers who seek strong rasterization at a reasonable price. The specs may appear familiar on paper.

However, subtle adjustments to memory bandwidth, clock speeds, and cache size should yield an experience that is on par with or better than that of previous-generation cards. In the sections that follow, I'll walk through pricing, architectural details, benchmark results, and key takeaways, allowing the data to speak for itself before I share my ML insights.

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Pricing and Market Position

At an MSRP of $500, the 7800 XT slots neatly between AMD's higher-end offerings and the competition. You'll notice that this price is $100 below what many expected based on the rest of the RDNA 3 stack.

By setting the cost at $8.33 per compute unit, compared to over $10 on the 7900 series, AMD has effectively undercut both its premium models and rival GPUs. If you're shopping on a budget, the 7800 XT's value proposition is immediately clear: it delivers near-6800 XT performance while undercutting similarly capable GeForce alternatives.

Architectural Specifications

On the surface, the 7800 XT bears a striking resemblance to the three-year-old 6800 XT. Core count drops by roughly 17%, but AMD compensates with an 8% higher boost clock. Where things become interesting is the memory subsystem: while Infinity Cache capacity is halved, bandwidth jumps by 63%.

The same 256-bit bus remains, but you're now working with 19.5 Gbps GDDR6, yielding a 22% increase in raw memory throughput. Together, these adjustments allow each core to operate more efficiently and transfer data more rapidly, perhaps offsetting the lower computational resources.

System and Methodology of Testing

I used a 32 GB DDR5-6000 memory module and a Ryzen 7 7800X3D test bench to assess performance. Drivers were entirely up to date, and I tested the AMD reference version of the 7800 XT across 16 modern titles.

I'll focus here on a dozen games, comparing results at 1080p, 1440p, and 4K, both with and without ray tracing. All data has been validated, and I've complemented raw frame rates with cost-per-frame analyses based on MSRP and real-world retail pricing.

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Rasterization Performance

In A Plague Tale: Requiem at 1080p, the 7800 XT delivers nearly identical performance to the 6800 XT, hovering just above 90 fps, which also edges out the RTX 4070. At 1440p, you'll see roughly 88 fps, again matching the older card yet outpacing NVIDIA's offering by about 9%. However, at 4K, the newer model slips 12% behind the 6800 XT, clocking in at around 51 fps.

In Resident Evil 4, the pattern repeats: at 1080p, you're essentially running on par with the 6800 XT, and performance remains stable up to 1440p. Once you hit 4K, the 7800 XT sustains roughly 74 fps, landing it about 12% ahead of the RTX 4070.

Cyberpunk 2077 is one of the first examples where the 7800 XT shows a clear uplift, around 8% faster than the 6800 XT at 1080p, beating the RTX 4070 by 9%. At 1440p, it matches the 7900 GRE and maintains a 16% lead over NVIDIA's midrange option. At 4K, despite dropping to 45 fps, it still outpaces the RTX 4070 by 22%.

In Hogwarts Legacy, you'll get 111 fps at 1080p, a 16% gain over the RTX 4070. At higher resolutions, the margin diminishes, yet it remains roughly 13% ahead of NVIDIA at 4 K.

In Forza Horizon 5, the card achieves approximately 140 fps at 1440p, just a couple of frames behind the 6800 XT. At 4K, it sustains 101 fps, delivering a 12% uplift compared to the RTX 4070 but only a 4% boost over the RDNA 2 card.

Spider-Man Remastered is an outlier: at 1080p, the 7800 XT is 11% faster than the 6800 XT, though still shy of the RTX 4070. By 4K, you're within 3% of NVIDIA's performance.

In The Last of Us Part I, at 1080p, you'll see 111 fps—about 5% ahead of the 6800 XT and 10% over the RTX 4070. Even at 4K, it matches the RTX 3080 while running 7% faster than the 6800 XT.

Fortnite proved to be a weakness: the 7800 XT trails the 6800 XT by 14% across all resolutions and lags behind the RTX 4070 by 10% at 4 K.

Across a 15-game rasterization average, the 7800 XT is essentially a modernized 6800 XT—about 3% faster at both 1080p and 1440p. Relative to the RTX 4070, you gain around 6% at 1440p while paying $100 less.

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Ray Tracing Performance

With ray tracing on in A Plague Tale: Requiem at 1080p, you'll get around 67 fps—6% better than the 6800 XT but 26% behind the RTX 4070. At 1440p, the margin over NVIDIA narrows to 20%; at 4K, you're limited to 30 fps.

In Resident Evil 4 with ray tracing, the 7800 XT hits 157 fps at 1080p—matching the RTX 4070 and 10% up on the 6800 XT. At 4K, it maintains 75 fps on par with the RTX 3080 and 6800 XT.

Even at medium ray tracing settings in Cyberpunk 2077, the 7800 XT falls 22% behind the RTX 4070 at 1080p, averaging 58 fps. At 1440p, it nets 36 fps, outperforming the 6800 XT by 6% and the RTX 4060 Ti by 9%.

Ray tracing in Spider-Man Remastered is impressive, achieving 148 fps at 1080p—5% slower than the RTX 4070 and comparable to the 6800 XT. At 4K, it sustains 76 fps, just 8% behind the GeForce card.

In Fortnite (DX12 RT), the 7800 XT outperforms the RTX 4070 by seven frames per second at 1080p, representing a 7% gain over the 6800 XT. At 1440p, it achieves 60 fps—9% higher than the RDNA 2 model. In Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, performance matches the 6800 XT at 1080p with 87 fps, trailing the RTX 4070 by 8%. At 4K, you're down to 32 fps.

Over six ray-tracing titles, the 7800 XT averages 10% slower than the RTX 4070 at 1080p, on par with the RTX 3080, and about 5% faster than the 6800 XT. At 1440p, it remains 9% behind NVIDIA while delivering a 5% uplift over RDNA 2.

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Power Consumption

In Hitman 3, the 7800 XT reduces total system draw by 13% compared to the 6800 XT, achieving nearly identical performance, although it still consumes 15% more power than the RTX 4070. Spider-Man is 9% less energy than its predecessor, but remains 12% thirstier than NVIDIA's midrange card.

Cost per Frame

Using MSRP data and 15-game averages, the 7800 XT boasts the best cost per frame of any current or prior-generation GPU tested. You'll pay 25% less per frame than with the 6800 XT and 21% less than with the RTX 4070, making it the clear value leader.

Even at real-world street prices, the 7800 XT competes closely with a heavily discounted stock of older RDNA 2 models. Compared to a discounted $530 6800 XT, you're still looking at an 8% improvement in value, plus a 21% edge over NVIDIA's offering.

Focusing solely on ray-tracing workloads, the 7800 XT remains 8% more cost-effective than the RTX 4070 at MSRP and 26% better than a hypothetical $650 6800 XT. Even factoring in discounts, it sustains a 10% value advantage over the older AMD card.

Cooling and Thermals

After an hour of full-load testing, the AMD reference model reached a junction temperature of 75 °C, with hotspots exceeding 85 °C. Fans spun at 1600 RPM—audible but not excessively loud.

Third-party designs fare better: PowerColor's Hellhound peaked at 68 °C with a hotspot of 77 °C, all while running fans at just 650 RPM. XFX's Merc 319 clocked higher—averaging 2270 MHz—but maintained a similar temperature profile, with fans at 1200 RPM.

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Key-Takeaways

After three years, it's disappointing to see so few generational gains. Performance comparisons reveal a card that's roughly equivalent to a 6800 XT in most raster titles, with only occasional uplifts in select games. Ray tracing remains a relatively weak spot as well.

However, if you're upgrading from an older GPU, the 7800 XT's combination of solid performance, ample VRAM, and aggressive $500 pricing makes it an easy recommendation.

You're getting the best cost per frame in the current market, and with the upcoming FidelityFX Super Resolution 3, you may find additional value down the line. Until then, if you want more performance per dollar than NVIDIA offers, this is the card you'll want to pick up.

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