Graphics card model numbers do not always make it obvious how two cards compare, especially across different brands and generations. This calculator takes a GPU’s core specifications and estimates its relative performance tier, giving gamers and PC builders a quick way to see roughly where a card sits before checking full reviews.
| GPU | Score (RTX 4090 = 100) | Tier | VRAM | Recommended PSU |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RTX 5090 | 123 | Flagship / 4K | 32GB | 1000W+ |
| RTX 4080 | 80 | High-end / 4K | 16GB | 750W+ |
| RX 9070 XT | 78 | High-end / 1440p-4K | 16GB | 750W+ |
| RTX 4070 Super | 62 | Mid-range / 1440p | 12GB | 650W+ |
| RX 7800 XT | 58 | Mid-range / 1440p | 16GB | 700W+ |
| RTX 4060 | 38 | Entry / 1080p | 8GB | 550W+ |
| RX 6600 | 33 | Entry / 1080p | 8GB | 500W+ |
Every GPU in our list, ranked, is on the GPU tier list.
How this is calculated: the formula on our Methodology page. Sources: part specs from each maker’s official product page (our hardware database); scores positioned from publicly reported review averages.
Quick answer
This calculator estimates a graphics card’s relative performance tier — entry-level, mid-range, high-end, or flagship — from its gaming-performance score, ComputingSkill’s own index of average gaming throughput at high settings (RTX 4090 = 100), placed from publicly reported third-party review averages. Because the score follows how cards perform in games rather than their core counts, NVIDIA and AMD cards can be compared on a level footing.
What the Result Means
The result is a relative performance tier — such as entry-level, mid-range, high-end, or flagship — along with an approximate comparative score. This tells you roughly what class of gaming (1080p, 1440p, or 4K) and settings a card is generally built for, based on its specifications rather than its price or marketing name. A higher tier generally correlates with higher achievable frame rates at a given resolution and settings level.
This tier is most valuable as a comparison tool between two specific cards, or as a sanity check against your CPU’s tier using the CPU vs GPU calculator. It is also a useful cross-check against a card’s advertised “tier” — since marketing names do not always line up cleanly with real generational improvements.
How This Calculator Works
The result comes from two things stored for each card: its gaming-performance score, ComputingSkill’s own index of average rasterized gaming throughput at high settings with the RTX 4090 at 100, and a tier label (such as Mid-range / 1440p) that says what resolution the card suits. Both are placed from publicly reported third-party review averages; we don’t benchmark cards ourselves. Core counts and clocks aren’t compared directly, because they mean different things across architectures: a newer architecture can get more performance from a similar core count.
As a worked example, compare the GeForce RTX 4070 (5888 CUDA cores, Ada Lovelace, 200W) with the GeForce RTX 3060 12GB (3584 CUDA cores, Ampere, 170W). The RTX 4070 scores 55 and is rated Mid-range / 1440p; the RTX 3060 scores 34 and is rated Entry / 1080p.
Cross-brand comparisons work the same way: the Radeon RX 7800 XT (60 compute units, RDNA 3) and the GeForce RTX 4070 Super (7168 CUDA cores, Ada Lovelace) can’t be compared by core count, so the calculator compares their scores instead: 58 for the RX 7800 XT and 62 for the RTX 4070 Super, both rated Mid-range / 1440p.
Important Limitations
This tool reports a tier and score placed from published specifications and third-party review averages; it does not run an actual rendering benchmark on physical hardware. Real-world GPU performance also depends on memory bandwidth, driver optimization for specific games, VRAM capacity relative to the game’s needs (see the VRAM calculator), and game-specific factors like how well a title is optimized for a particular architecture.
Ray tracing and upscaling performance in particular can vary between architectures in ways that a general performance tier does not fully capture — some architectures handle ray tracing workloads proportionally better or worse than their general rasterization tier would suggest. Use this result as a general reference for comparing cards, not as a guaranteed frame rate figure for any specific game.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I compare an NVIDIA card and an AMD card directly with this?
Yes. The score follows how each card performs in games in published third-party reviews rather than its core count, so NVIDIA, AMD and Intel cards sit on one scale, with the RTX 4090 at 100.
Why does a newer card with fewer cores sometimes score higher?
Architecture improvements can increase how much work each core does per clock cycle. So a newer card with fewer cores can run games faster than an older one with more. The calculator doesn’t count cores at all: each card’s score is placed from how it performs in published reviews, which already takes that into account.
Does this calculator account for ray tracing performance specifically?
No. The score stands for average rasterized gaming performance at high settings, without ray tracing, so cards with stronger ray tracing hardware can pull further ahead in ray-traced games. For ray-tracing-heavy use, treat the tier as a general guide rather than a ray tracing benchmark.
Is a higher tier always the right choice for me?
Not necessarily. The right tier depends on your target resolution, refresh rate, and budget. A mid-range card is often the better value choice for 1080p or 1440p gaming, while flagship tiers mainly matter for 4K or very high refresh rate targets.