AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT and Radeon RX 5700 Review: New Prices Keep Navi In The Game

Reviews
By Chris Angelini
last updated

The Radeon RX 5700 series bests its Nvidia competitors but lacks ray tracing and tensor core hardware.

Why you can trust Tom's Hardware Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.

Performance Results: 3840 x 2160

The pursuit of playable performance at 3840 x 2160 with quality settings maxed out takes us back a few years. Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 1080 came close to making 4K an enjoyable experience, while the 1080 Ti pushed performance up one tier higher. With Radeon RX 5700 XT nestling in between those two cards, smooth frame rates at 4K should be—and is, in most games—an achievable target.

The notable exceptions include Final Fantasy XV, where even the High quality settings hammer performance across the board. GeForce RTX 2080, the fastest card we tested, fails to break an average frame rate of 50. Both Tom Clancy games punish our pool as well. We benchmark The Division 2 using its Ultra preset, while Ghost Recon is evaluated using the Very High preset. Consider coming down at least one level in either game if you’re serious about pushing these cards to 3840 x 2160.

More serious issues affect Metro Exodus at 4K, where much of the field is playable. But the two Navi-based cards endure serious frame time spikes that hammer their average frame rates. Tweaking the game’s settings doesn’t change our benchmark’s outcome so we’re inclined to flag this one a bug that AMD’s driver team needs to address. Company representatives say they’re investigating.

Battlefield V (DX12)

Image 1 of 7

Destiny 2 (DX11)

Image 1 of 7

Far Cry 5 (DX11)

Image 1 of 7

Final Fantasy XV (DX11)

Image 1 of 7

Forza Horizon 4 (DX12)

Image 1 of 7

Grand Theft Auto V (DX11)

Image 1 of 7

Metro: Exodus (DX12)

Image 1 of 7

Shadow of the Tomb Raider (DX12)

Image 1 of 7

Strange Brigade (Vulkan)

Image 1 of 7

Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 (DX12)

Image 1 of 7

Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon (DX11)

Image 1 of 7

The Witcher 3 (DX11)

Image 1 of 7

Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus (Vulkan)

Image 1 of 7

MORE: Best Graphics Cards

MORE: GPU Benchmarks

MORE: All Graphics Content

Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini
Chris Angelini is an Editor Emeritus at Tom's Hardware US. He edits hardware reviews and covers high-profile CPU and GPU launches.
See more GPUs Reviews
41 Comments Comment from the forums
  • ICWiener
    Honestly I'd pay the extra just for Nvidia's decent cooler, let alone power consumption, RTX, etc. Hard pass on another blower.
    Reply
  • justin.m.beauvais
    Dear AMD,
    Why? Wasn't your line GTX 1080 performance at RX 580 prices? points at Navi This is not that.
    Regrettably yours,
    Your Fans
    Reply
  • alextheblue
    ICWiener said:
    Honestly I'd pay the extra just for Nvidia's decent cooler, let alone power consumption, RTX, etc. Hard pass on another blower.
    I read the review, don't know what you mean by "let alone power consumption". Efficiency is virtually the same. I personally prefer blowers as long as they're not crazy loud, and the review says they're not so I'm all for it. If you DON'T like blowers, I'm sure there will be third-party coolers that improve cooling performance and acoustics further (and dump heat into the chassis like crazy).
    justin.m.beauvais said:
    Dear AMD,
    Why? Wasn't your line GTX 1080 performance at RX 580 prices? points at Navi This is not that.
    Regrettably yours,
    Your Fans
    Who ever promised that? They are 10-11% faster than same-priced Nvidia models. They're not going to drop 5700 $100 bucks when they're already ahead by 11%, even though I would love lower prices, there's no incentive for them to do so.
    Reply
  • face-plants
    I'm pleasantly surprised by both the performance AND the last-minute drop in price. Personally I don't like blower style cards and will be on the lookout for third-party offerings with more traditional dual fan coolers. This is totally personal preference as I tend to build in bigger cases with plenty of ventilation to deal with the extra heat. If the prices don't get too out of line from the AIBs then I'll gladly give a few of these cards a go in upcoming builds. I'm also expecting a decent improvement in thermals so hopefully these FE cards aren't exemplary of the best cooling you can get on air. The prospect of building all AMD machines in the coming months has got me totally nerding out.
    Reply
  • kinggremlin
    alextheblue said:
    I read the review, don't know what you mean by "let alone power consumption". Efficiency is virtually the same. I personally prefer blowers as long as they're not crazy loud, and the review says they're not so I'm all for it. If you DON'T like blowers, I'm sure there will be third-party coolers that improve cooling performance and acoustics further (and dump heat into the chassis like crazy).
    Who ever promised that? They are 10-11% faster than same-priced Nvidia models. They're not going to drop 5700 $100 bucks when they're already ahead by 11%, even though I would love lower prices, there's no incentive for them to do so.

    You didn't read the review. Ignoring the Furmark results which don't mirror any realworld scenario. The 5700xt is slower than the 2070 Super while using more power and running over 10degrees C hotter in gaming.
    Reply
  • alextheblue
    kinggremlin said:
    You didn't read the review. Ignoring the Furmark results which don't mirror any realworld scenario. The 5700xt is slower than the 2070 Super while using more power and running over 10degrees C hotter in gaming.
    Yes, I did, stop being obstinate. Ah, I get it, you must have read "efficiency" in my post as "power consumption", or something. Why are you comparing it to the 2070 Super? The 5700 is the same price as the 2060 and 11-12% faster on average (between TH and AT), and the 5700XT is the same price as the 2060 Super and roughly 10-11% (TH-AT) faster. Yes, they use more power, but they're faster. As a result the efficiency is pretty close. It varies based on workload (game title), but I have read the reviews here and AT (so far, haven't looked at a third review yet). Here:

    https://www.anandtech.com/show/14618/the-amd-radeon-rx-5700-xt-rx-5700-review/15
    Factor in the performance gain (in AT's suite it was 11% for the XT and 12 for vanilla 5700) and you'll see their power consumption is pretty good. Average that with TH's results in Metro: LL and the final efficiency is pretty neck and neck with their direct competitors.

    I didn't say they didn't run hot. For people that don't like blowers (as I already said) there will be cooler, quieter third party options.
    Reply
  • digitalgriffin
    alextheblue said:
    I read the review, don't know what you mean by "let alone power consumption". Efficiency is virtually the same. I personally prefer blowers as long as they're not crazy loud, and the review says they're not so I'm all for it. If you DON'T like blowers, I'm sure there will be third-party coolers that improve cooling performance and acoustics further (and dump heat into the chassis like crazy).
    Who ever promised that? They are 10-11% faster than same-priced Nvidia models. They're not going to drop 5700 $100 bucks when they're already ahead by 11%, even though I would love lower prices, there's no incentive for them to do so.

    In all honesty, all these cards are expensive. $350 would have been the most I wanted to pay for a 5700XT. And the card does run hot. Pascal was a small move up in prices. Turing was just insane pricing wise.

    That being said I bought one today and said "F"-it. I just don't like NVIDIA's business ethics. It will get the job done for two to three years.
    Reply
  • Axiss
    any idea when the board partner cards come out?
    Reply
  • randomizer
    How many engineers looked at those fan curves in lab testing and thought they were good?

    I think this release is a bit underwhelming. Local pricing here makes the RX 5700 fairly unattractive compared to a 2060, but the XT is better positioned against the 2070. Not sure it's really worthwhile upgrading a 970 though.
    Reply
  • daglesj
    So for the many of us on a RX480?...

    Worth it? Could someone not dig out the previous AMD midrange value demon to test against? C'mon...
    Reply