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CompareYourGPU

Best GPU under $500

The strongest graphics card you can buy without going over $500, judged at 1440p.

How this is ranked: Cards priced at $500 or below only. 45% performance index at 1440p, 35% performance per dollar, 20% VRAM headroom. Only cards still in production are eligible. Any price-based element uses launch MSRP, because CompareYourGPU holds no verified current price for these cards.

#1
Top pickAMD$349 MSRPCategory score 60/100

AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB

The cheapest 16 GB card in this database. Its 128-bit bus limits how far the memory advantage stretches, but for 1080p and light 1440p it removes VRAM from the list of things to worry about.

  • $349 launch MSRP.
  • Estimated 60-85 FPS at 1440p in a typical modern AAA game at High settings, no upscaling. Modelled estimate, not a measurement.
  • 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus.
  • 9.5 performance index points per $100 at 1440p.

Strengths

  • 16 GB of VRAM at well under $400
  • 160 W on a single 8-pin connector
  • FSR 4 and modern ray accelerators in a budget card

Trade-offs

  • 128-bit bus and 320 GB/s of bandwidth cap its ceiling
  • The 8 GB variant shares the name and is a different product
  • Ray tracing is usable rather than strong

Cheaper alternative: Arc B580 at $249

More powerful: RTX 5060 Ti 8GB at $379

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#2
Intel$249 MSRPCategory score 58/100

Intel Arc B580

The most memory you can buy at this price: 12 GB on a 192-bit bus for entry-level money. Ray tracing is respectable for the tier, but the card needs Resizable BAR to perform as intended, and driver maturity varies more than it does on NVIDIA or AMD.

  • $249 launch MSRP.
  • Estimated 50-70 FPS at 1440p in a typical modern AAA game at High settings, no upscaling. Modelled estimate, not a measurement.
  • 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus.
  • 10.8 performance index points per $100 at 1440p.

Strengths

  • 12 GB of VRAM and 456 GB/s of bandwidth at an entry-level price
  • Ray tracing performance is competitive with cards costing more
  • AV1 encode and decode, plus VVC decode

Trade-offs

  • Requires Resizable BAR; performance drops sharply on platforms without it
  • Driver behaviour in older titles is less consistent than the competition
  • 190 W is high for the performance it delivers

Cheaper alternative: Arc B570 at $219

More powerful: RTX 5060 at $299

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#3
NVIDIA$429 MSRPCategory score 57/100

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB

The 16 GB version is the one worth buying in this tier. It pairs a modest GPU with a memory pool large enough that texture settings stop being a compromise at 1080p and 1440p.

  • $429 launch MSRP.
  • Estimated 65-95 FPS at 1440p in a typical modern AAA game at High settings, no upscaling. Modelled estimate, not a measurement.
  • 16 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 128-bit bus.
  • 8.4 performance index points per $100 at 1440p.

Strengths

  • 16 GB of VRAM at a mid-range price, unusual for this tier
  • 180 W runs on a single 8-pin connector and a 600 W supply
  • Full DLSS 4 feature set including Multi Frame Generation

Trade-offs

  • 128-bit memory bus limits how much of that 16 GB the GPU can actually exploit
  • Raw performance is a modest step over the previous generation
  • The 8 GB variant shares the same name and is a materially different product

Cheaper alternative: RX 9060 XT 16GB at $349

Full specificationsCompare with alternatives

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