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Cyberpunk 2077 Performance Evolution from RTX 2080 Ti to RTX 5090 After 5 Years

A five-year journey showcasing how Cyberpunk 2077's performance evolved alongside major advances in GPU rendering technology

Hardware by Yoshi on  Dec 24, 2025

Cyberpunk 2077 is already five years old. To celebrate, Nvidia is giving away a signed, Cyberpunk-themed RTX 2080 Ti. It is a beautiful piece of hardware that serves as a good reminder of where the game and GPU technology were when it came out. The milestone is a great time to look back at how Cyberpunk 2077 ran on RTX 2080 Ti and compare that to how it runs on today's top-of-the-line hardware.

Looking Back at the RTX 2080 Ti Era

NVIDIA had technically already released the RTX 30 series by the time Cyberpunk 2077 came out. Still, it was hard to find during the mining-heavy period. Back then, 1440p displays were much more common than they are now. There were 4K monitors with high refresh rates, and some players hooked up their PCs to 120Hz TVs, but 1440p was the best resolution for most configurations.

Cyberpunk 2077, Performance Evolution, RTX 2080 Ti, RTX 5090, NoobFeed

That's why most of the tests were done at 1440p. When DLSS first came out, it ran in performance mode. The transformer model wasn't available yet, frame generation didn't exist, and path tracing hadn't been included yet.

Ray tracing was set to ultra, which was usually adequate to keep the frame rate close to 60 fps; it dropped a lot in hard regions. People expected concessions back then, especially since the game had performance issues at first and later received patches.

Ray Tracing On Versus Off

Ray tracing on and off makes a big difference when you move about Night City. Without ray tracing, reflections in windows and on surfaces go away, leaving a flatter but still pretty image that uses typical rasterized lighting. Turning ray tracing back on makes reflections and lighting look much more lifelike, especially in scenarios with glass structures and complicated light sources.

There was a big difference in performance. When ray tracing was activated, the frame rates stayed between 60 and 70 fps. When I turned it off, performance improved to around 100 fps. It was always up to the user to decide if the visual update was worth the hit. For people with lower-end RTX cards like RTX 2060 or RTX 2070, turning off ray tracing completely was typically the best option.

Tweaking Settings on RTX 2080 Ti

It was even hard to tweak the ray tracing settings. When ray-traced lighting was disabled, but reflections remained enabled, frame rates were approximately 80 fps. However, even a modest quantity of ray-traced lighting or shadows caused performance to drop noticeably. It was hard to get balanced settings because each ray tracing capability cost a lot.

Even with these problems, ray tracing definitely made images look better in little but important ways. Many players chose to put up with lower frame rates to get those improvements. In contrast, others sought better performance and consistency.

4K Testing on RTX 2080 Ti

RTX 2080 Ti was brave to switch to 4K. With ultra-performance DLSS, the frame rate ranged from 50 to 60 fps, making the game unexpectedly watchable. Internally, though, the game was upscaling from a very low resolution, and early versions of DLSS weren't as good as the ones we have now.

Later DLSS improvements improved image reconstruction, but 4K with ray tracing was still a stretch. When DLSS was turned down from ultra performance to performance, frame rates dropped to 30–40 fps, which felt like a console.

The graphics were still better than those on consoles, especially for ray tracing effects, but the performance cost was rather high. At these settings, the best option would have been to lock the game to 30 fps.

Experimenting With Path Tracing on Older Hardware

RTX 2080 Ti was not the main focus when path tracing was added later. It took a lot of sacrifices to make it work. At 1440p with ultra performance DLSS, frame rates were about 40 fps, which was playable but made the image seem very bad because the internal resolution was so low.

Fine details, like leaves and distant objects, were clearly affected. When I switched DLSS to higher quality levels, the picture got clearer right away, but performance dropped. Ray tracing and path tracing obviously improved the visuals, but the RTX 2080 Ti was not designed to exploit them this way.

Transitioning to the RTX 5090

Switching to RTX 5090 really showed how much hardware has changed. With the same baseline settings as the RTX 2080 Ti test at 1440p with performance DLSS and ultra ray tracing, frame rates reached 130–140 fps, and GPU usage was around 60%. It was clear that the performance boost happened even without manually tweaking CPU affinity.

Cyberpunk 2077, Performance Evolution, RTX 2080 Ti, RTX 5090, NoobFeed

The power usage was roughly 300W, which is a little more than RTX 2080 Ti's 250W, but still considerably below RTX 5090's limit. Turning on DLAA and the new transformer model increased GPU usage to close to 100% while keeping the frame rate at roughly 110–120 fps, making the image look cleaner and steadier.

Modern 4K Expectations

4K high-refresh-rate monitors and TVs are easier to find now than when the RTX 2080 Ti launched. More and more people are using a flagship GPU with a 4K monitor. At 4K with good DLSS and extreme ray tracing, the frame rate was approximately 100 fps; it varied slightly depending on the scene's complexity.

It was still hard to enable path tracing at 4K, but it was still possible. Frame rates are reduced to around 60 fps in very reflective situations. Using balanced or performance DLSS or turning on frame generation would easily make things run faster. Even without those options, though, the experience was still significantly superior than what was possible on older technology.

Visual Tradeoffs and Personal Preference

At 4K, the picture still looked good even when ray tracing was turned off completely. However, it was evident immediately away that there were fewer reflections and less depth in the lighting. Path tracking was pricey, but it made Night City feel more real, affecting the game's overall mood. A lot of gamers are okay with 60 fps with path tracing, especially when frame generation is employed to make the action smoother.

What you like is what matters in the end. Turning off ray tracing still helps lower-end cards, but high-end hardware finally lets these features shine without too many tradeoffs.

Reflections on Five Years of Progress

When you play Cyberpunk 2077 again with RTX 2080 Ti, you can see how ahead of its time it was. The card can still provide you with a playable experience, even with current improvements like route tracing. Still, it comes with many trade-offs. The industry has come a long way since RTX 2080 Ti was out over seven years ago, though maybe not as far as some people thought it would.

Ray tracing is still evolving. It has improved a lot, but it still doesn't work on all levels of hardware. RTX 5090 shows how much better performance has gotten, even though that gain comes with more power needs and huge GPUs.

 

There is a clear trend toward more advanced rendering methods, such as neural rendering, in the future. The next generation may not fully adopt it, but the tendency is evident. Cyberpunk 2077 is still a good way to keep track of that development and a reminder of how swiftly things may change.

Cyberpunk 2077 is already five years old. To celebrate, Nvidia is giving away a signed, Cyberpunk-themed RTX 2080 Ti. It is a beautiful piece of hardware that serves as a good reminder of where the game and GPU technology were when it came out. The milestone is a great time to look back at how Cyberpunk 2077 ran on RTX 2080 Ti and compare that to how it runs on today's top-of-the-line hardware.

Looking Back at the RTX 2080 Ti Era

NVIDIA had technically already released the RTX 30 series by the time Cyberpunk 2077 came out. Still, it was hard to find during the mining-heavy period. Back then, 1440p displays were much more common than they are now. There were 4K monitors with high refresh rates, and some players hooked up their PCs to 120Hz TVs, but 1440p was the best resolution for most configurations.

That's why most of the tests were done at 1440p. When DLSS first came out, it ran in performance mode. The transformer model wasn't available yet, frame generation didn't exist, and path tracing hadn't been included yet. Ray tracing was set to ultra, which was usually adequate to keep the frame rate close to 60 fps; it dropped a lot in hard regions. People expected concessions back then, especially since the game had performance issues at first and later received patches.

Ray Tracing On Versus Off

Ray tracing on and off makes a big difference when you move about Night City. Without ray tracing, reflections in windows and on surfaces go away, leaving a flatter but still pretty image that uses typical rasterized lighting. Turning ray tracing back on makes reflections and lighting look much more lifelike, especially in scenarios with glass structures and complicated light sources.

Cyberpunk 2077, Performance Evolution, RTX 2080 Ti, RTX 5090, NoobFeed

There was a big difference in performance. When ray tracing was activated, the frame rates stayed between 60 and 70 fps. When I turned it off, performance improved to around 100 fps. It was always up to the user to decide if the visual update was worth the hit. For people with lower-end RTX cards like RTX 2060 or RTX 2070, turning off ray tracing completely was typically the best option.

Tweaking Settings on RTX 2080 Ti

It was even hard to tweak the ray tracing settings. When ray-traced lighting was disabled, but reflections remained enabled, frame rates were approximately 80 fps. However, even a modest quantity of ray-traced lighting or shadows caused performance to drop noticeably. It was hard to get balanced settings because each ray tracing capability cost a lot.

Even with these problems, ray tracing definitely made images look better in little but important ways. Many players chose to put up with lower frame rates to get those improvements. In contrast, others sought better performance and consistency.

4K Testing on RTX 2080 Ti

RTX 2080 Ti was brave to switch to 4K. With ultra-performance DLSS, the frame rate ranged from 50 to 60 fps, making the game unexpectedly watchable. Internally, though, the game was upscaling from a very low resolution, and early versions of DLSS weren't as good as the ones we have now. Later DLSS improvements improved image reconstruction, but 4K with ray tracing was still a stretch.

When DLSS was turned down from ultra performance to performance, frame rates dropped to 30–40 fps, which felt like a console. The graphics were still better than those on consoles, especially for ray tracing effects, but the performance cost was rather high. At these settings, the best option would have been to lock the game to 30 fps.

Experimenting With Path Tracing on Older Hardware

RTX 2080 Ti was not the main focus when path tracing was added later. It took a lot of sacrifices to make it work. At 1440p with ultra performance DLSS, frame rates were about 40 fps, which was playable but made the image seem very bad because the internal resolution was so low.

Fine details, like leaves and distant objects, were clearly affected. When I switched DLSS to higher quality levels, the picture got clearer right away, but performance dropped. Ray tracing and path tracing obviously improved the visuals, but the RTX 2080 Ti was not designed to exploit them this way.

Cyberpunk 2077, Performance Evolution, RTX 2080 Ti, RTX 5090, NoobFeed

Transitioning to the RTX 5090

Switching to RTX 5090 really showed how much hardware has changed. With the same baseline settings as the RTX 2080 Ti test at 1440p with performance DLSS and ultra ray tracing, frame rates reached 130–140 fps, and GPU usage was around 60%. It was clear that the performance boost happened even without manually tweaking CPU affinity.

The power usage was roughly 300W, which is a little more than RTX 2080 Ti's 250W, but still considerably below RTX 5090's limit. Turning on DLAA and the new transformer model increased GPU usage to close to 100% while keeping the frame rate at roughly 110–120 fps, making the image look cleaner and steadier.

Modern 4K Expectations

4K high-refresh-rate monitors and TVs are easier to find now than when the RTX 2080 Ti launched. More and more people are using a flagship GPU with a 4K monitor. At 4K with good DLSS and extreme ray tracing, the frame rate was approximately 100 fps; it varied slightly depending on the scene's complexity.

It was still hard to enable path tracing at 4K, but it was still possible. Frame rates are reduced to around 60 fps in very reflective situations. Using balanced or performance DLSS or turning on frame generation would easily make things run faster. Even without those options, though, the experience was still significantly superior than what was possible on older technology.

Visual Tradeoffs and Personal Preference

At 4K, the picture still looked good even when ray tracing was turned off completely. However, it was evident immediately away that there were fewer reflections and less depth in the lighting. Path tracking was pricey, but it made Night City feel more real, affecting the game's overall mood. A lot of gamers are okay with 60 fps with path tracing, especially when frame generation is employed to make the action smoother.

What you like is what matters in the end. Turning off ray tracing still helps lower-end cards, but high-end hardware finally lets these features shine without too many tradeoffs.

Reflections on Five Years of Progress

When you play Cyberpunk 2077 again with RTX 2080 Ti, you can see how ahead of its time it was. The card can still provide you with a playable experience, even with current improvements like route tracing. Still, it comes with many trade-offs. The industry has come a long way since RTX 2080 Ti was out over seven years ago, though maybe not as far as some people thought it would.

Ray tracing is still evolving. It has improved a lot, but it still doesn't work on all levels of hardware. RTX 5090 shows how much better performance has gotten, even though that gain comes with more power needs and huge GPUs.

There is a clear trend toward more advanced rendering methods, such as neural rendering, in the future. The next generation may not fully adopt it, but the tendency is evident. Cyberpunk 2077 is still a good way to keep track of that development and a reminder of how swiftly things may change.

Also, check our other articles below:

Tasnim Yoshi

Subscriber, NoobFeed

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