Is it worth upgrading?
A newer card winning every row of a comparison table does not make it worth buying. This works out how much faster it actually is at your resolution, what that improvement costs per percentage point, and whether a cheaper card would get you most of the way there.
Both cards have to be ones CompareYourGPU tracks. The database currently covers current and recent desktop cards, so if you are coming from something older it may not be listed yet. See what is covered.
RTX 3090 → RX 9070 XT at 1440p
Worth considering
Marginal- Performance gain
- +26%
- Estimated, native
- Measured cross-check
- Not tested
- Upgrade cost
- $599
- Price of the new card
- Cost per 1% gained
- $23
What you gain
- In favour: Estimated 26% more performance at 1440p.
- In favour: Estimated frame rate moves from roughly 90-130 FPS to 115-165 FPS.
- In favour: 26.2% stronger in ray-traced workloads.
- In favour: Adds FSR 3.1 Frame Generation, AMD Fluid Motion Frames 2 (driver-level), FSR 4.
- In favour: Works out at about $23 per percentage point of performance gained.
What it costs you
- Caution: You would lose 8 GB of memory, going from 24 GB to 16 GB.
The two cards side by side
| Measure | RTX 3090 | RX 9070 XT | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Estimated FPS at 1440p | 90-130 | 115-165 | +26% |
| VRAM | 24 GB | 16 GB | -8 GB |
| Board power | 350 W | 304 W | -46 W |
| Ray tracing index | 42 | 53 | +26.2% |
| Price on record | $1,499 | $599 | -$900 |
| Launched | September 24, 2020 | March 6, 2025 | 4.4 years apart |
Where these numbers come from
- Performance gain: CompareYourGPU estimated index, native resolution, no upscaling.
- VRAM, board power and features: manufacturer specifications.
- Prices: launch MSRP. CompareYourGPU holds no verified street price for these cards, so the cost per percentage point is a reference figure rather than what you would pay today.
- The cost of the upgrade is the price of the new card. CompareYourGPU does not model what your current card might sell for.