Minecraft With Ray Tracing Will Likely Require RTX 2060 or Better for 1080p at 60 FPS

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Ray tracing starts with the entry-level RTX cards.

(Image credit: Nvidia)

It’s no secret that Nvidia is revamping certain classics to add ray tracing support. In August, it revealed that Minecraft was going to be one of these titles. What we did not know, however, is what kind of hardware gamers would require to run Minecraft with RTX. 

(Image credit: Nvidia)

If you’re gaming at 1080p resolution, you'll probably need an RTX 2060 or better to hit 60 frames per second (fps), as reported by Game Debate and PCGamesN.  However, this isn't a guarantee; both reports say this is just what Nvidia is targeting. 

For higher resolutions, the RTX 2080 Super and RTX 2080 Ti are expected to be able to smoothly run Minecraft with GeForce RTX at 4K.

(Image credit: Nvidia)

Ouch, that's all a hefty ask. However, I suppose the 'I built a $2,000 gaming PC but only use it to play Minecraft' joke won’t be a joke anymore.

That being said, it seems Minecraft may seriously benefit from ray tracing, if Nvidia's screenshots and videos are any evidence.

The RTX 2060 is Nvidia's most affordable card that comes with the RT cores for ray tracing. The Founder's Edition variants carries a $399 MSRP.

It’s not yet clear when the Minecraft with RTX update will land, but we do know that it will come as a free update for those who own the game.

Niels Broekhuijsen
Niels Broekhuijsen

Niels Broekhuijsen is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He reviews cases, water cooling and pc builds.

2 Comments Comment from the forums
  • ManDaddio
    Not "ouch". Ray Tracing is very resource-intensive. There's a reason why Nvidia went with a hardware solution instead of a software solution. it's very unfortunate that AMD downplayed the importance of real-time Ray Tracing to the point where people are just acting unsensible about it.
    Anybody who loves gaming should be praising Nvidia for pushing this graphical technology or method of improving graphics. Nvidia did not invent Ray Tracing. But they did work with Microsoft and they're DXR API so that as soon as it was ready they had hardware that would use it. If we're not politically driven then there should be nobody complaining.
    It's unfortunate the popular tech tubers and some tech journalist sites are convincing people that buying the cheapest possible stuff because of price per performance is the best thing for them. Now all those people seem to do is complain all the time because everything's too expensive.
    I would love everything to be a dollar too. But that's not going to drive innovation is it? Competition isn't the only thing that is good for consumers. Sometimes companies have to take a risk and a leap of faith in consumers to adopt a good technology.
    If AMD was the first to bring out the ray tracing technology and even sold their gpus at the same price the media would be bearing down to them and giving them the highest praise.
    What is our world coming to? Do people really not understand how bad the socialist mindset is for a society?
    Sure it works at home with the family but that's where it actually works. The money goes from the parents to the kids. That's because it's for a noble purpose. The nurturing of the children and their well-being.
    Anyway anyway I am glad that Nvidia is working with these games. Everyone should be happy about this because people were complaining that there wasn't enough games. That their hardware wasn't strong enough. Well now we have older games that people can enjoy Ray Tracing with.
    If AMD customers are unhappy they should then write a letter to AMD and tell them to put some ray-tracing support in their drivers so that they can play these games too.

    It it is really that simple. AMD is the only one holding AMD back and their fans.
    I I am sorry for any spelling or grammar mistakes because I am on my mobile phone and it autocorrects by itself.
    Tom's hardware: thank you for the article. 👍☺
    Reply
  • larkspur
    admin said:
    Ouch.

    Minecraft With Ray Tracing Will Likely Require RTX 2060 or Better for 1080p at 60 FPS : Read more
    Muwahaha, this whole article reads like it's a big surprise that you need an RTX card to play a game with real-time RT! Now we finally have confirmation! You need a RTX 2060 minimum, lol...
    Reply