Nvidia, in 2018 launched the very first adoration of Ray tracing-enabled cards in the market, which bought a revolution in the gaming space.
For the first time, developers can develop their games with Ray Tracing in mind, making the game look even better with the light behaving more realistically.
The first flagship of Ray Tracing cards was the RTX 2080 Ti, a powerful card. These cards allowed gamers to turn on Ray tracing, but these cards would fall short of the promises by Nvidia as RTX meant a lot of frames were being lost, and a game running at 100 fps would dip down to 50 fps.
Nvidia, after two years, launched the ampere cards, with the flagship being the RTX 3090 Ti which was undoubtedly a massive leap in performance.
In this article, I will do a direct 3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti and see if you should upgrade from the 2080 Ti to the 3090 Ti. So without further ado, let us get right into it.
Technical Specifications
| GPU Name | RTX 3090 Ti | RTX 2080 Ti |
|---|---|---|
| CUDA Cores | 10752 Units | 4352 Units |
| Base Clock | 1560 MHz | 1350 MHz |
| Boost Clock | 1860 MHz | 1545 MHz |
| Video Memory | 24GB GDDR6X | 11GB GDDR6 |
| Memory Bandwidth | 1,008 GB/s | 616.0 GB/s |
| Bus Width | 384-bit | 352-bit |
| RT Cores | 84 | 68 |
| Tensor Cores | 336 | 544 |
| Architecture | Ampere | Turing |
| Process Size | 8 nm | 12 nm |
| Power Draw | 450W | 250W |
| Recommended PSU | 850W | 600W |
3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti Game Benchmarks (4K Ultra)
Testing Setup
- CPU: Intel i7 12700K
- MOBO: ASUS ROG Strix Z690-F
- RAM: Crucial DDR5 4800Mhz 32GB
- GPU 1: ZOTAC GeForce RTX 3090 Ti AMP Extreme Holo
- GPU 2: MSI GAMING GeForce RTX 2080 Ti
- Storage: Samsung 980 SSD
- Case: Cooler Master H500P
#1: Red Dead Redemption 2
The first game on my list today is Red Dead Redemption 2, which is exceptionally graphically intensive; however, Rockstar has optimized it very well, making it very hardware friendly.
Running this game at 4K with all the settings cranked to Ultra, I saw the 3090 Ti average at around 76 frames per second. The 1% low here was 70 fps. The 3090 Ti has no problems running this game, with everything cranked up at 4K.
Moving on to the 2080 Ti, I saw a massive dip in performance, with the game now averaging at around 44 frames per second, with the 1% low at 31 frames per second.
This gameplay test was done in Saint-Denis, a comparatively more dense area, and the wilderness where most of the game takes place has me seeing 56 frames per second on average.
#2: Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020
Microsoft Flight Simulator is a highly ambitious game, to say the least, as its open world is as big as the world we live in, which is why this game brings many computers to their knees and is a challenging game to run on most computers.
This is evident from my tests, as the RTX 3090 Ti could only average 44 frames per second, with the 1% low being at 33.
The 2080 Ti also suffers here as this card could only hit 36 frames per second at 4k ultra settings with the 1% low at a measly 24 frames per second. The flight simulator does a lot better if you lower the resolution on both the cards.
#3: Destiny 2
Destiny 2, despite being a beautiful game, was not much of a problem for both of these cards to run at 4K Ultra settings. The RTX 3090 Ti averaged 108 frames per second with a 1% low of 99 frames.
The RTX 2080 Ti was 42 percent slower than its successor as it could only hit 70 frames per second on average, with a 1% low of 56 frames.
#4: Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
Assassin’s Creed games have some of the best open worlds available for players to explore, making them extremely hardware intensive. Ubisoft, however, does try its best after the lessons learned from Unity.
This is why I saw the 3090 Ti hit 63 frames per second on average at 4k with all the settings cranked up to Ultra, with the 1% low at 56 frames per second.
I saw a 29% decrease in performance when I switched to the RTX 2080 Ti, with the card hitting 44 frames per second on average with the 1% low of 30 frames.
#5: Metro Exodus
The final game on my list today is Metro Exodus. Running this game at 4K Ultra settings, the RTX 3090 Ti gave me 63 frames per second with the 1% of 46 fps.
The RTX 2080 Ti suffers from a 31% performance decrease as it could only muster 35 frames per second on average, with a 1% low of 29.
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3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti: Video Output And Ports
In this section, I am going to discuss the Video out ports on both of these cards. The RTX 3090 Ti has four ports in total, and I have one HDMI 2.1 port with three DisplayPort 1.4a which means that this monitor can run four monitors simultaneously.
On the other hand, The RTX 2080 Ti has five ports instead of four. I have the usual HDMI 2.0 port, a slightly older adoration of this port. I also have three DisplayPort 1.4a and one USB Type-C port, making this card run five monitors simultaneously.
3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti: Pricing And Availability
The RTX 3090 Ti was released at an MSRP of $1999, which is a lot of money, especially for a graphics card. There was a time when you could not find this card at this rate, and you would need to shell out a lot more money to get your hands on such a card.
However, with the Ethereum merge and the announcement of the 4000 series, this card can be had for somewhere in the neighborhood of $1000, which is a fair price, in my opinion.
The 2080 Ti has an MSRP of $999; however, you do not need to pay this price anymore as they have become significantly cheaper nowadays. You can get your hands on one of these for around $400, which is more than a fair price to pay for this card.
3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti: Power And Cooling
The RTX 3090 Ti is an extremely power-hungry card, evident from the 450-watt TDP. The kind folks at Nvidia suggest you get an 850 watts power supply for this card to run properly; however, you should get a 1000-watt PSU to be safe.
The 3090 Ti has a single fan reference design which I do not think is adequate for such a card. The reference design no doubt looks a lot better; however, you should go for the three fan versions produced by the board partner. Or better yet, water cools this power-hungry GPU to get better thermals and efficiency.
On the other hand, The RTX 2080 Ti is also a power-hungry card but not as much as its successor. The card has a TDP of 250 Watts, with Nvidia suggesting a PSU of 600 watts. Going a little over the suggested GPU will always be my recommendation.
Strangely enough, the reference design for the 2080 Ti has two fans instead of one, which makes it better than the 3090 Ti in terms of air-cooling. However, you can always get a better three-fan version from board partners or water-cool it.
3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti: Ray Tracing And DLSS And More
As I mentioned, The Turing 2000 series and the Ampere 3000 series are ray-tracing cards. These cards also have new features called DLSS, where you turn down the resolution of the game, and DLSS using AI upscales it back again without using the resources of the GPU.
I tested two games with RTX and DLSS: Control and Wolfenstein: Youngblood. Control at 4K Ultra Settings gave me 125 frames per second on the 3090 Ti, with the 1% low being 115 frames. On the other hand, the RTX 2080 Ti could average 70 frames per second.
In Wolfenstein: Youngblood, the RTX 3090 Ti averaged around 149 frames per second, with an average 1% low of 122 frames per second. On average, the 2080 Ti hit 108 frames per second, with a 1% low of 88 frames per second.
3090 Ti vs 2080 Ti: Features And Architecture
The RTX 3090 Ti is from the ampere architecture built on the 8 nm process size. This card has various features like Ray Tracing and DLSS. This card supports APIs like Direct X 12, OpenGL 4.6, OpenCL 3.0, Vulkan 1.3, CUDA 8.6, and Shader Model 6.6.
The RTX 2080 Ti is from the Turing architecture of GPUs, which was built on the 12 nm process size. This card was the first generation of RTX cards and had support enabled along with the first generation of DLSS.
This card also supports the latest APIs, which include DirectX 12, OpenGL 4.6, OpenCL3.0, Vulkan 1.3, CUDA 7.5, and Shader Model 6.6.
My Final Thoughts On It!
I think this should be more than it is for comparing the flagships of the two successive generations. The ampere cards were a significantly massive leap over the Turing cards, and if you have some money in your pocket for a PC, I recommend you buy a 3070 Ti over the 2080 Ti.
However, if you already have the 2080 Ti on your PC and are looking to upgrade to the 3090 Ti, then it will be an excessive purchase as this card is still extremely powerful and makes light work of all the games released or will be released.
I need to clarify that if you prioritize ray tracing and want a card that can muster outstanding performance with RTX, I would only recommend getting a 3090 Ti.
