Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 benchmarks just leaked — and AMD should be worried

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Leaked GeForce RTX 3080 benchmarks promise big bump over RTX 2080 Ti

Nvidia RTX 3080
(Image credit: Shutterstock)

Anticipation is building around Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 3080, and a new set of leaked benchmarks reveal a huge leap over last generation — and could give Nvidia a big boost over AMD in the next-gen GPU wars.

Spotted by Hardware Leaks, a 3DMark benchmark result for what’s claimed to be the GeForce RTX 3080 shows that it’s up to 21% faster the GeForce RTX Titan, Nvidia’s most powerful graphics card. But the Titan isn’t really a consumer GPU, so for a better comparison, the GeForce RTX 3080 achieved a score of 18,257, which comes in at 30% faster than the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Founders Edition, a top-end current-generation graphics card.

It’s worth noting that the GeForce RTX 3080 wasn’t mentioned by name. Rather, the benchmark result was labelled as “unknown Nvidia Ampere GPU.” But as Nvidia tends to usher in a new generation of GPUs with a top-end graphics card, we can expect this card to be the equivalent of the RTX 3080 even if it doesn’t end up using that nomenclature. 

Given the GPU comes with a 1,935MHz core speed and 6,000MHz memory clock speed, there’s no doubt that this graphics card is a high-end component rather than a mid-range GPU from Nvidia. 

According to HardwareLeaks, the GA102 die that the RTX 3080 will be based on will come in three variants: a top-of-the-line Titan model, a RTX 3090 or Ti model, and the standard RTX 3080. And memory configuration for the GPU will come in 24GB, 12GB, and 10GB variations. This was further let credence by tech leaker KatCorgi on Twitter.  

With a memory bandwidth of 21Gbps, the RTX 3090 — which could also be called the RTX 3080 Ti — looks set to be an absolute powerhouse of a graphics card. Though the RTX 3080’s touted bandwidth of 19Gbps likely means it’ll be no slouch when it comes to high-end graphics performance. 

All this is adding up to the new Ampere-based GeForce RTX graphics cards being a significant upgrade over the current GeForce GPUs that use the Truing architecture. We’re also expecting next-generation GeForce graphics cards to come with onboard ray-tracing performance, potentially even having a co-processor to help take care of that demanding rendering technique. 

Ray-tracing performance is likely to be more important in future games, as the PS5 and Xbox Series X will have ray-tracing hardware and could usher in a new generation of titles that use the realistic lighting technology. So having a series of GPUs that can chew through the graphical demands of ray-tracing could be a boon for PC gamers. 

We’re expecting Nvidia to take the covers off its next GeForce RTX lineup at some point in August or September. And it will need to do, so as it’s arch-rival AMD is supposed to debut a high-end Radeon graphics card that set to be a GeForce killer. 

Roland Moore-Colyer
Roland Moore-Colyer

Roland Moore-Colyer a Managing Editor at Tom’s Guide with a focus on news, features and opinion articles. He often writes about gaming, phones, laptops and other bits of hardware; he’s also got an interest in cars. When not at his desk Roland can be found wandering around London, often with a look of curiosity on his face.