Borderlands 3 Graphics Benchmark

We nigh lost count of how many graphics cards we put down for this exam, merely allow's say it was roughly sixty GPUs from both camps to check out Borderlands 3 performance. For testing we're running the game in the DirectX 11 mode which nosotros found to be overall smoother than DX12, which is still in development for this title.

Borderlands 3 seems to hammer the CPU quite a bit and we doubtable the DRM is to arraign for that. A lot of quad-core owners are complaining about horrible stuttering, so that's something to be aware of. For testing we've used our Cadre i9-9900K test bed clocked at 5 GHz with 16GB of DDR4-3400 retention. After some investigation we decided against using the built-in benchmark and nosotros generally attempt to avoid canned benchmarks when we tin. Instead we are using the 'propaganda center' for our test though functioning does announced to be close to the numbers you'll get with the benchmark tool.

On that note, if you're looking to squeeze the best possible Borderlands 3 operation with a marginal visual hit, check out Tim's fantabulous optimization guide on YouTube. He was able to heave functioning by around 50% using customized settings for virtually no image quality difference when compared to the Ultra preset.

Some additional testing notes. For the GeForce graphics cards we're using the Game Ready 436.30 driver and for Radeons the Adrenalin 2022 Edition 19.ix.ii driver. Both are optimized for Borderlands 3, so make sure you're running the latest driver version. Our benchmark was run using the ultra preset at 1080p, 1440p and 4K, so re-tested with a few GPUs at 1080p with the medium preset. Nosotros've thrown in a heap of older GPUs as well for good mensurate.

Benchmarks

Starting from the top we take, of course, the RTX 2080 Ti where it pumped out an average of 122 fps, which for 1080p doesn't seem all that high. The RTX 2080 and 1080 Ti were limited to around 105 fps which is honestly the kind of functioning you'd hope to see at 1440p in a game like this.

Moving on the RTX 2070 Super was 9% faster than the 5700 XT on average which is a pretty typical margin and a expert result for the Radeon GPU considering the 1% low result was also slightly better for the 5700 XT.

A niggling further downwards nosotros encounter the standard 5700 averaged 80 fps in our test making it a little faster than the GTX 1080 on average and much better when comparing the 1% low data. Unfortunately, nosotros couldn't test the RTX 2060 Super nor the 2080 Super as we accept those cards on a separate duty for testing Ray Tracing on content that will go live shortly.

When compared to the standard RTX 2060, the Radeon 5700 was 8% faster, so not a huge margin and that means information technology should exist comparable to the 2060 Super. As you might take expected Vega 56 matched the GTX 1070 while Vega 64 was a smidge faster, placing it just behind the 1070 Ti.

The GTX 1660 Ti does well here, basically matching the GTX 1070 while beating the onetime GTX 980 Ti, the flagship from a few generations dorsum. The vanilla GTX 1660 gives the RX 590 a hard time, delivering 12% more frames and that's quite good given it'due south only about 10% more than expensive. The GTX 1660 besides averaged over 55 fps in our test whereas the RX 590 brutal below 50 fps.

Making our style down to the GTX 1060 and RX 580 at just under 50 fps, even the 3GB model of the 1060 does pretty well at 1080p. The former GTX 970 does okay with 41 fps and nosotros come across simply 39 fps from the RX 570. The GTX 1650 is the cut off here though and even then you'll want to commencement optimizing the quality settings for better performance.

The 1440p results show a similar pattern, now starting at 90 fps on average with the RTX 2080 Ti. That's comparable performance to what y'all'll see in a title like Assassin's Creed Odyssey and much worse than The Segmentation ii, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and Metro Exodus, to cite a few examples.

The standard RTX 2080 was 21% slower rendering 71 fps on average and nosotros run across a further seven% performance downgrade with the 2070 Super. This time the 2070 Super was xi% faster than the 5700 XT, merely once more that doesn't really justify the 25% increase in price. The standard 2070 and not-XT version of the 5700 were comparable in terms of performance, pushing frame rates into the mid 50s. Then correct on the cusp of 50 fps nosotros find the GTX 1080 and RTX 2060.

Dropping below 50 fps y'all'll find GPUs such every bit Vega 56 and 64 along with the GTX 1070 and 1660 Ti. Once we become downward to the GTX 1660 you'll actually demand to reduce the quality settings for better functioning. A lot of these GPUs averaged around 25-xxx fps and obviously that's non an ideal situation on PC.

Jumping up to 4K hammers performance as you'd expect and now even the RTX 2080 Ti can't attain threescore fps on average. That said, with Tim'south optimizations the 2080 Ti should exist good for a piddling over 70 fps on average in our test. Maybe we would have done more benchmarking using tweaked graphics settings across the lath but past the time we had the information nosotros were already 50 GPUs deep into testing.

This also ways that with optimized quality settings you should be able to push button near 60 fps at 4K with the GTX 1080 Ti or RTX 2080.

Medium Settings on Upkeep GPUs

To wrap up testing we ran a few GPUs with the medium quality preset while also adding more upkeep and older GPUs to the mix. Here nosotros see a massive eighty% performance improvement for the GTX 1660 when going from ultra to medium. The GTX 1060 saw a 75% performance increment and is now pushing 82 fps on average at 1080p.

The splendid value Radeon RX 570 saw a massive 109% performance uplift when downgrading the quality preset from ultra to medium. We too and then a big 78% increase for the R9 390, though it wasn't as staggering every bit the 570'southward bound. Nosotros see some old GPUs like the GTX 970 performing well with the medium quality preset. The R9 290 is also hanging in there quite comfortably with 67 fps on boilerplate.

There'southward a relatively new GPU we've yet to mention and that'southward because information technology was too deadening using the ultra quality settings, the GTX 1650. With medium settings it boilerplate 65 fps which is decent, though for less money the RX 570 was nearly 30% faster, hence our usual recommendation in favor of the budget Radeons.

Yet the GTX 1650 was much faster than older loftier-terminate GPUs such as the R9 280X and GTX 770. The oldies still boilerplate 50 fps at 1080p, and so that puts you on fully playable territory which is bang-up. There were loads of GPUs in this functioning class, such as the R9 380X, 7970, 1050 Ti, 680, 1050, 380 and 680.

For an boilerplate of forty fps or better all you'll demand is the Radeon HD 7950 or GTX 960.

Wrap Up

That'south how Borderlands 3 performs at launch using a range of GPUs with the ultra and medium quality settings. Information technology'due south a shame the quality presets practice so poorly in this championship. Y'all can achieve a lot by tweaking the settings manually and doing will atomic number 82 to around a 50% boost over the ultra quality results shown here.

Every bit we noted on the feature's opening, quad-cadre CPUs seem to exist getting maxed out in this championship, something we'll have to investigate farther. As for retentivity, you lot'll too want 16GB of RAM for smooth performance, nosotros often saw total system usage around 7GB when running Borderlands 3, with the game itself consuming around 3GB.

Equally for graphics memory, 4GB appears fine for 1080p. The 3GB GTX 1060 did well in our testing only we have a loftier-end arrangement that may be masking operation problems with that configuration. We got away with 4GB even at 1440p. Naturally for gaming at 4K you'll desire at least 6GBs of VRAM, although GPU horsepower becomes a larger issue at 4K and high-end GPUs have well over that amount of memory these days, and so that should be a not-result.