The best graphics card in 2021

As the heart and soul of every gaming PC, graphics cards turn zeros and ones into beautiful pixels on your screen. However, we are here to separate out the must haves from want to be the best. Some people are searching for the fastest graphics card, while others are looking for the best value. No other component influences your gaming experience as much as the best graphics card.

Here, we listed the best graphics card in 2021:

1. GeForce RTX 3080:

Nvidia's GeForce RTX 3080 features Ampere architecture, which has been updated. At a cost of $500 less, it's almost 30 percent quicker than the previous generation 2080 Ti. A greater price meant that the RTX 3080 Ti couldn't displace the incumbent. For 4K or 1440p gaming, this is the card to purchase - it's overkill for 1080p gaming, however ray tracing effects in games that support the feature make 1080p acceptable.

For those who didn't get on the RTX GPU bandwagon in the first round, the RTX 30-series might be the ticket to getting on board. In games like Cyberpunk 2077, which use even more ray traced effects, the RTX 3080 is your best chance for playing games in all of their ray traced splendor without breaking the bank, thanks to its possibly double the performance of Turing.

For DLSS, Ampere also provides better Tensor Cores. We can expect to see more of this technology in future games given that it doesn't require training by a supercomputer every game. This is mostly due to the fact that Unreal Engine 2.0 just requires a toggle and UI update to get it running. This is fantastic news for Nvidia, as AMD's new RX 6000 cards lag behind in terms of conventional rasterization performance.

2. Radeon RX 6800 XT:

For Team Red, the optimal graphics card is AMD's Radeon RX 6800 XT. Technically, the RX Radeon 6900 XT is 5-7 percent quicker, but it costs 54 percent more than the 6900 XT. Even though you don't receive more VRAM or any other bonuses, that's still not a fantastic bargain. The RX 6800 XT offers a significant increase in performance and functionality over the RX 5700 XT. It includes support for ray tracing and is 70-90 percent quicker in our test suite than previous versions.

The enthusiast community called the GPU 'Big Navi' before its introduction, and we got precisely what we wanted. There are twice as many shader cores in Navi 21 than there were in Navi 10. RAM is also doubled in Navi 21. We've never seen a reference GPU clock faster than this, by around 300 MHz. The RX 6800 XT has a 300W TDP, which is significantly less than the RTX 3080's 320W TDP.

Thanks to AMD's large 128MB Infinity Cache, the company's performance is boosted significantly by the technology. There is a 119 percent increase in effective bandwidth with this device. 16GB of RAM will be plenty for most upcoming games, thus the 6800 XT is in good shape in that regard.

3. Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 Super:

Rather to using Very High or Ultra settings, we performed our gaming tests on High in order to guarantee we could record playable frame rates for the bulk of the titles in our review. Our scores have been updated to incorporate GTX 1660 Ti and RTX 2060 whenever feasible. The average and minimum framerates are 1080p and 1440p, respectively.

When it comes to benchmarks, the GTX 1650 Super is a top-notch 1080p gaming GPU. This resolution has a maximum-minimum frame rate of 73 frames per second. There were 42 to 89 frames per second in 1080p.

Most triple-A games will run smoothly and at an acceptable framerate with this card. Even on screens with 144Hz refresh rates, a 1080p resolution is assured.

It was unable to play Metro: Exodus with the GTX 1650 Super - it managed only 23 frames per second. Some games, even at 1080p, may need you to make graphical sacrifices. With this GPU, the most demanding games cannot be played at high settings.

It will also be impossible to play at 1440p with the GTX 1650 Super as well. Metro and Crysis 3 ran at minimal frame rates of 19fps and 33fps, respectively, under these conditions. Extra money is required for a 1440p display with a stable frame rate.

The GTX 1650 Super was a touch slower than its primary rival, but that was the standard. In 3D Mark Fire Strike and Time Spy, the Nvidia graphics card earned 10,849 and 5,048 points, respectively. During these tests, it received scores of 12,425 and 5,237, respectively.

FAQ

How can I buy a graphics card in the GPU drought?

You could attempt to manually refresh every store page in the hopes of striking gold on the next restock; that's one way to go about it. Or, you could sign up to a trusty app that goes about trawling major retailers for you. It's not a bot that tries to snap up stock the wrong way, it just does the refreshing so you don't have to.

We've had success with the app HotStock in the UK, and sites such as Stock Informer offer a similar service in the US, although we've not used this service to score stock personally.

Similarly, you can find plenty of free Discord servers with dedicated stock alert bots and eagle-eyed community members, such as the popular StockDrops server.

And don't forget Twitch streams. Those dedicated to finding you stock will often fire out a deafening klaxon the moment stock appears. We recommend checking out Falcodrin on Twitch for Nvidia GPUs, but there are plenty of kind souls out there offering a similar service.

It's not for everyone, but the best way to ensure you'll receive a graphics card this year, and a modern one at something close to MSRP, is to buy a prebuilt gaming PC. It's a worthy consideration if you're considering a total rebuild some point in the future, at least. System builders appear to enjoy a more stable supply of graphics cards, and while some still expect delays, you are at least guaranteed a PC with GPU in situ eventually.

Is SLI or CrossFire still a thing?

If you're looking for maximum performance, you used to be able to run two cards in SLI or CrossFire. However, it's become increasingly common for major games to ignore multi-GPU users completely. That includes all DXR games. There's also the fact that fewer of the next-gen cards actually support the linking of two cards. On the Nvidia side, only the $1,500 RTX 3090 comes with NVLink connections, and then only for creative apps.

Do I need a 4K capable graphics card?

The obvious answer is: Only if you have a 4K gaming monitor. But there are other things to consider here, such as what kinds of game do you play? If frame rates are absolutely king for you, and you're into ultra competitive shooters then you want to be aiming for super high fps figures. And, right now, you're better placed to do that at either 1440p or 1080p resolutions.

That said, the more games, such as CoD: Warzone, that incorporate DLSS, then more Nvidia cards will be capable of making a close approximation of 4K visuals on your 4K monitor, but at higher frame rates.