Overclocked RTX 5080 is about the same as a stock 4090 in this Black Myth Wukong benchmark
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The launch of Nvidia’s RTX 5080 has been rough, as securing a unit is no easy feat. Reports from major UK retailer Scan suggest that this shortage could last up to 20 weeks if Team Green doesn't improve its distribution process. On top of that, the RTX 5080 has faced criticism, with initial reviews stating that the GPU doesn't justify its $1,000 price tag and that its specifications place it closer to the 70-class GPU range.
However, amid the backlash, there seems to be one area where the RTX 5080 might excel. According to a Reddit post shared by user Duccix, overclocking the RTX 5080 allowed it to achieve similar performance to a stock RTX 4090 in Black Myth: Wukong. This suggests that the RTX 5080 might have more overclocking headroom than the 4000-series GPUs – something that has been backed up by popular YouTube JayzTwoCents.
- GPU: GB203
- CUDA Cores: 10752
- VRAM: 16GB GDDR7
- Memory Bus width: 256 bit
- Base Clock speed: 2295 MHz
- Boost Clock speed: 2617 MHz
Similar levels of performance with lower VRAM usage
According to the benchmarks, both GPUs achieved an average of 96 FPS, with the RTX 5080 reaching a maximum of 112 FPS and the RTX 4090 hitting 113 FPS. Both cards delivered the same minimum FPS of 82, but the RTX 5080 had a slight edge in the Low 5th percentile, reaching 86 FPS compared to the RTX 4090’s 85 FPS. Another interesting detail was VRAM usage; the RTX 5080 utilized only 10GB of VRAM, while the RTX 4090 used nearly 1GB more, reaching 10.9 GB. Now, we’ve seen Nvidia claim that its new frame-generation AI model is more memory-efficient, reducing VRAM usage by 30%.
Some users pointed out that a fairer comparison would be between an overclocked RTX 5080 and an overclocked RTX 4090. However, as others noted, the 4000 series doesn't seem to overclock as well as what we are seeing with 5000 series GPUs. One user even mentioned that their RTX 4080 Super crashes at just +100 MHz on the core clock. With that said, an overclocked RTX 4090 might give you about 4% faster performance than the RTX 5080, but the gap becomes much smaller, to where the new features may make you break for the 5080.
There could be some bottlenecking at play here
One factor making these benchmarks unconvincing for some is that the user's system features AMD's Ryzen 7 5800X paired with both the 4000 and 5000 series GPUs. Some users argue that using such an underpowered CPU (comparatively) with these GPUs in an Unreal Engine game like Black Myth: Wukong is why the RTX 4090 isn't taking a much bigger lead. While the game is said to be more GPU-intensive, meaning the graphics card is doing most of the heavy lifting, there is no doubt that bottlenecking is present, so that's something to keep in mind when analyzing these benchmarks.
That said, not everyone is convinced by the RTX 5080's performance enough to justify an upgrade, especially for RTX 4090 owners. The 4090 delivers similar performance without putting as much stress on the GPU and also offers 8GB more VRAM, while the RTX 5080 is limited to 16 GB. Nonetheless, even if you were considering the jump to the RTX 50 series for its DLSS 4 and multi-frame generation benefits, that would make sense if the GPUs weren't so difficult to find.
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