ASRock Challenger RX 9070 16GB drops to $549 – get more VRAM than an RTX 5070 for the same amount of green

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Get a high-performing mid-range GPU with 16GB of VRAM for just $540

Radeon RX 9070 Challenger 16GB
(Image credit: ASRock)

VRAM is one of the most important factors when choosing a graphics card, and ASRock's latest RX 9070 16 GB Challenger graphics card has plenty of it. The RDNA 4 GPU is $50 off its normal price at Newegg, making it as cheap as the more affordable RTX 5070 graphics cards on the market. Best of all, the RX 9070 has more VRAM than the RTX 5070 (12GB), making this deal quite enticing if you are in the market for a graphics card in this price range.

The Challenger version is technically ASRock's cheapest 9070 offering, but it doesn't skimp on much, boasting a beefy triple-fan cooling system, with a nickel-plated copper base, Japanese capacitors, and a 2-ounce copper PCB.

ASRock ASRock Challenger RX 9070 16GB
Save $50
ASRock ASRock Challenger RX 9070 16GB: was $599 now $549 at Newegg

The ASRock Challenger RX 9070 16GB is $50 off, featuring competitive 1080p and 1440p gaming performance with its 4,096 shader cores and 16GB of VRAM.

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The RX 9070 16GB is AMD's latest mid-range GPU, based on the RDNA 4 architecture. The GPU can provide a competent gaming experience at 1080p or 1440p, thanks to its 4,096 shader cores, 2.97GHz boost clock, 64 MB of L2 cache, and 16GB of VRAM wired to a 256-bit interface.

In our benchmarks, the RX 9070 16GB often outperforms the RTX 5070, particularly in rasterization benchmarks. For example, at 4K native resolution, the RX 9070 beats the RTX 5070 by 11% in our 16-game rasterization-only geomean.

The extra 4GB of VRAM further helps the RX 9070 in memory-bound titles. Games are getting more and more demanding, and while 12GB of VRAM can generally get you by in most games, we are starting to see that amount being a limiting factor when pushing ultra settings. 16GB gives you more memory overhead, and is a capacity that is capable of enabling modern high-performance GPUs to run any game today at maximum settings at 4K resolution.

If you want a more in-depth comparison, check out our RTX 5070 vs RX 9070 face-off.

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RTX 5070 vs RX 9070 Benchmark Comparison
(Image credit: Future)

At $549, the ASRock Challenger RX 9070 16GB is an excellent deal in a market where GPU sales don't often exceed 5% of the GPU's value. With the discount, the RDNA 4 GPU is priced as low as Nvidia's cheapest RTX 5070 12GB partner models on sale today.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, or CPU Deals pages.

Aaron Klotz
Aaron Klotz
Contributing Writer

Aaron Klotz is a contributing writer for Tom’s Hardware, covering news related to computer hardware such as CPUs, and graphics cards.

9 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Alvar "Miles" Udell
    Effectively the same average performance at 1920x1080 (106fps vs 109fps) and 2560x1440 (85fps vs 80fps), yet you lose Nvidia specific gestures, all for effectively the same price.

    Except for MS Flight Simulator 2024 I see no reason to recommend the 9070 over the 5070, even with less RAM.
    Reply
  • Pemalite
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Effectively the same average performance at 1920x1080 (106fps vs 109fps) and 2560x1440 (85fps vs 80fps), yet you lose Nvidia specific gestures, all for effectively the same price.

    Except for MS Flight Simulator 2024 I see no reason to recommend the 9070 over the 5070, even with less RAM.
    The 5070 has less performance. Albeit average of 11%.
    The 5070 has less ram.
    AMD has better drivers. Loads better drivers.

    And what features? FSR4 is very competitive with DLSS now... AMD has Frame gen as well.

    The 9070 is very appealing against the 5070.
    Reply
  • logainofhades
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Effectively the same average performance at 1920x1080 (106fps vs 109fps) and 2560x1440 (85fps vs 80fps), yet you lose Nvidia specific gestures, all for effectively the same price.

    Except for MS Flight Simulator 2024 I see no reason to recommend the 9070 over the 5070, even with less RAM.

    I would choose the 9070 over the 5070 any day. I don't have a use of Nvidia specific features. With the 9070 I get more vram, and don't need to mess with the melty connector. I know it probably isn't melting on these cards, but I still wouldn't want to use it. It's a terrible design that I do not trust.
    Reply
  • King_V
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Effectively the same average performance at 1920x1080 (106fps vs 109fps) and 2560x1440 (85fps vs 80fps), yet you lose Nvidia specific gestures, all for effectively the same price.

    Except for MS Flight Simulator 2024 I see no reason to recommend the 9070 over the 5070, even with less RAM.

    6.7% slower at 1080 medium
    2.9% slower at 1080 ultra
    7% slower at 1440 ultra
    11% slower at 4k ultra

    But, even looking at the graphs in this sale article rather than the hierarchy chart, I'm failing to see your logic.

    Except for Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2, I see no reason to recommend the 5070 over the 9070, and VRAM is not even in question.
    Reply
  • Amdlova
    1080p cards for 549 yeah right
    Reply
  • logainofhades
    Amdlova said:
    1080p cards for 549 yeah right

    If you play unoptimized slop like Borderlands 4, you could be using a $2k+ card for 1080p, and still possibly struggle at max settings. :rofl:
    Reply
  • usertests
    King_V said:
    6.7% slower at 1080 medium
    2.9% slower at 1080 ultra
    7% slower at 1440 ultra
    11% slower at 4k ultra
    5070 Super should be pretty interesting. 18 GB to negate the 9070's VRAM advantage, but also 4% more cores (in contrast to the other Supers that have no change) and presumably higher clocks (has a higher TDP). That should help it to eke out a tie or slight win.

    Seems like RDNA5 is coming 2027, so there's a whole year where AMD will need to use pricing or some kind of RDNA4 refresh to respond.
    Reply
  • qwertymac93
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Effectively the same average performance at 1920x1080 (106fps vs 109fps) and 2560x1440 (85fps vs 80fps), yet you lose Nvidia specific gestures, all for effectively the same price.

    Except for MS Flight Simulator 2024 I see no reason to recommend the 9070 over the 5070, even with less RAM.
    Warhammer is really skewing the results at 1080p and this isn't a resolution I think buyers of this class of card are interested in anyway. 1440p high refresh or 4k is what a $500+ GPU should get you and the 9070 excels at that, especially with a raised power limit when undervolted. Which if you get a 9070, you absolutely should do.

    The main killer feature Nvidia has going for it is AI software support right now and with only 12GB of VRAM, the 5070 isn't all that appealing here.
    Reply
  • Alvar "Miles" Udell
    Pemalite said:
    The 5070 has less performance. Albeit average of 11%
    20 game geomean 1920x1080: 2.8% faster 9070 (109 vs 107)
    20 game geomean 2560x1440: 6.2% faster 9070 (85 vs 80)
    20 game geomean 4K: Sub 60fps both.

    Both are 1920x1080 90hz / 2560x1440 75hz cards, hence same effective performance

    Pemalite said:
    And what features? FSR4 is very competitive with DLSS now... AMD has Frame gen as well.

    RTX Dynamic Vibrance and other filters that dramatically improve the visual fidelity of games, especially older games. NVEnc for hardware assisted H.264/265 video encoding, among others.

    logainofhades said:
    I would choose the 9070 over the 5070 any day. I don't have a use of Nvidia specific features. With the 9070 I get more vram, and don't need to mess with the melty connector. I know it probably isn't melting on these cards, but I still wouldn't want to use it. It's a terrible design that I do not trust.

    Not a factor with these cards due to low power draw (sub-250w), likely sub-200w from the cable itself.

    King_V said:
    6.7% slower at 1080 medium
    2.9% slower at 1080 ultra
    7% slower at 1440 ultra
    11% slower at 4k ultra

    But, even looking at the graphs in this sale article rather than the hierarchy chart, I'm failing to see your logic.

    See above.

    ASRock's RX 9070 XT Challenger 16GB is on a 8% discount, making it just as cheap as the cheapest RTX 5070's on the market

    Technically that's not true: The PNY RTX 5070 OC is $7 cheaper at Best Buy and other places, at $542.99, after a 1.3% discount. I have this card and can attest it overclocks decently well as well, +122/+200 GPU/VRAM, and is very quiet under load, even while receiving sub-par airflow (vertical mounted against tempered glass side panel). And if you trust 3DMark Timespy for anything (I don't really), it's only 13% slower than the top 5070 using the same CPU, and this is as base of a version as you can get since the FE was discontinued.

    https://www.bestbuy.com/product/pny-geforce-rtx-5070-12gb-oc-gddr7-pci-express-5-0-graphics-card-with-triple-fan-black/JXF2C4642R
    Reply