AMD Radeon 880M vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 Comparison

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 and the AMD Radeon 880M represent two fundamentally different answers to the same question: how much graphics performance can you extract from a silicon budget. One is a discrete Pascal card from the GeForce 10 series, built on TSMC's 16 nm process with a dedicated 314 mm² die. The other is an integrated RDNA 3.5 GPU, the Strix Point design, fabricated on a 4 nm node and drawing just 15 W. The recorded data shows a clear overall leader, the GTX 1070 winning 8 of 10 head-to-head tests, but the margin varies enormously by workload and the 880M posts genuine wins in two modern API results.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU is faster overall?

A: The GeForce GTX 1070. It wins 8 of 10 recorded head-to-head benchmarks, holds an average benchmark score of 9780 against the 880M's 8436, and sits at the 47th percentile of all GPUs in the database versus the 880M's 43rd percentile.

Q: Does the Radeon 880M win anything?

A: Yes, two tests. It takes the Geekbench Vulkan result with 40006 points against 22121, a 44.7 percent lead, and the PassMark G2D test with 969 against 846, a 12.7 percent lead.

Q: How large is the gap in the most demanding test?

A: In the 3DMark Steel Nomad DirectX 12 test the GTX 1070 scores 1082 against 535, a 102.2 percent advantage for the Pascal card.

Q: How do their raw compute figures compare?

A: The GTX 1070 delivers 6.463 TFLOPS of FP32 versus 4.454 TFLOPS for the 880M. However, the 880M matches its FP16 throughput at 4.454 TFLOPS (a 1:1 ratio), while the GTX 1070 manages only 101.0 GFLOPS of FP16 (a 1:64 ratio).

Q: Which is newer, and which is still in production?

A: The 880M is far newer (July 2024 versus June 2016) and is an active product. The GTX 1070 is end-of-life, slotting between the GeForce 900 and GeForce 20 generations.

Q: How power-hungry is each?

A: The GTX 1070 is rated at 150 W TDP with a single 8-pin connector and a suggested 450 W power supply. The 880M runs at 15 W TDP, needs no power connectors, and is integrated into the processor package.

Architecture Differences

These two parts come from different eras and different design philosophies. The GTX 1070 uses NVIDIA's Pascal architecture on the GP104 die, manufactured by TSMC on a 16 nm process. It packs 7,200 million transistors into a 314 mm² die, yielding a density of 22.9M per mm². The Radeon 880M is built on AMD's RDNA 3.5 architecture as part of the Strix Point mobile family, produced on TSMC's 4 nm node. Despite a smaller 233 mm² die, it contains 34,000 million transistors, giving a density of 145.9M per mm², roughly six times the Pascal part's packing efficiency.

Resource allocation diverges sharply. The GTX 1070 fields 1920 shading units, 120 TMUs and 64 ROPs. The 880M offers 768 shading units, 48 TMUs and 16 ROPs, exactly 40 percent of the Pascal card's counts in each category. That scaling shows in throughput: the GTX 1070 delivers 107.7 GPixel/s and 202.0 GTexel/s against the 880M's 46.40 GPixel/s and 139.2 GTexel/s.

The most consequential feature difference is ray tracing. The 880M includes 12 RT cores and supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (feature level 12_2). The GTX 1070 has no RT cores and tops out at DirectX 12 (12_1). Both support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4. The 880M also moves the clock paradigm toward efficiency: a 400 MHz base with a 2900 MHz boost, compared to the GTX 1070's 1506 MHz base and 1683 MHz boost.

Memory is the other great divide. The GTX 1070 carries its own 8 GB of GDDR5 on a 256-bit bus, running at 2002 MHz (8 Gbps effective) for 256.3 GB/s of bandwidth. The 880M shares system memory entirely, so its size, type and bandwidth are all system dependent. Connectivity differs too: the GTX 1070 uses PCIe 3.0 x16, the 880M PCIe 4.0 x8.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The GTX 1070's strongest results come in legacy graphics workloads. Its largest margin is in PassMark DirectX 10, where 82 versus 31 is a 164.5 percent win. PassMark DirectX 9 is nearly as lopsided: 197 versus 97, a 103.1 percent gap. The modern DirectX 12 Steel Nomad test echoes that scale, 1082 versus 535, a 102.2 percent advantage, confirming the Pascal card's superiority holds even in a current-generation engine.

The general PassMark G3D score lands at 13498 against 7615, a 77.3 percent lead, and GPU compute goes to the GTX 1070 at 6102 versus 3719, a 64.1 percent margin. The middle ground belongs to PassMark DirectX 12 (48 versus 32, 50 percent), Geekbench OpenCL (44700 versus 31285, 42.9 percent) and PassMark DirectX 11 (100 versus 73, 37 percent).

The 880M's two victories are informative rather than anomalous. Its Geekbench Vulkan score of 40006 beats the GTX 1070's 22121 by 44.7 percent, a striking reversal that reflects how effectively the RDNA 3.5 drivers and drivers' Vulkan path exploit the newer architecture, something Pascal-era Vulkan performance cannot match in this test. Its PassMark G2D win (969 versus 846, 12.7 percent) shows competent display and 2D handling.

Context from the database reinforces the gap in standing. The GTX 1070's average score of 9780 places it statistically alongside the AMD FirePro W5000 (9803, within 0.2 percent), the NVIDIA Quadro M2000M (9832, 0.5 percent), the NVIDIA Tesla M10 (9724, 0.6 percent) and the Tesla C2070 (9716, 0.7 percent). The 880M's 8436 average sits next to the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 675MX (8427, 0.1 percent), the GeForce MX330 (8458, 0.3 percent), the AMD Radeon HD 8870M (8462, 0.3 percent) and the Radeon R9 M375X (8325, 1.3 percent). The 880M competes with entry-level mobile parts; the GTX 1070 holds mid-range workstation company.

Specification Differences

• Process node: 16 nm (GTX 1070) versus 4 nm (880M), both from TSMC.
• Transistors and die: 7,200 million over 314 mm² versus 34,000 million over 233 mm².
• Shading resources: 1920 / 120 / 64 (units / TMUs / ROPs) versus 768 / 48 / 16.
• Clocks: 1506 MHz base and 1683 MHz boost versus 400 MHz base and 2900 MHz boost.
• Memory: dedicated 8 GB GDDR5, 256-bit, 256.3 GB/s versus fully system-shared.
• FP16 throughput: 101.0 GFLOPS at a 1:64 ratio versus 4.454 TFLOPS at a 1:1 ratio.
• FP32 throughput: 6.463 TFLOPS versus 4.454 TFLOPS.
• RT cores: none versus 12.
• DirectX support: 12 (12_1) versus 12 Ultimate (12_2).
• TDP and power: 150 W, one 8-pin connector, 450 W suggested PSU versus 15 W with no connectors.
• Form factor: dual-slot discrete card (267 mm long, 112 mm high, 40 mm wide) with 1x DVI, 1x HDMI 2.0 and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a, versus an integrated GPU with portable-device-dependent outputs.
• Bus: PCIe 3.0 x16 versus PCIe 4.0 x8.
• Status and dates: end-of-life after June 2016 versus active since July 2024.
• Launch MSRP: the GTX 1070 launched at 379 USD; no launch MSRP is recorded for the 880M, as it ships only as an integrated component.

The Verdict

The data supports a straightforward recommendation for raw performance. Anyone who needs maximum frame rates, particularly in DirectX 9 through DirectX 12 rasterization workloads, should choose the GTX 1070: it wins eight of ten tests, leads by triple-digit percentages in older API tests, and holds 47th-percentile standing against the 880M's 43rd. Its dedicated 8 GB of GDDR5 with 256.3 GB/s of bandwidth also removes the memory-bottleneck uncertainty inherent in the 880M's system-shared design.

The 880M makes its case on three fronts. First, efficiency: 15 W of TDP with no power connectors versus 150 W plus a 450 W PSU requirement means it exists where the GTX 1070 simply cannot. Second, modern features: 12 RT cores and DirectX 12 Ultimate support, neither of which the GTX 1070 offers, plus dramatically better FP16 compute at a 1:1 ratio. Third, its 44.7 percent Vulkan win in Geekbench shows the architecture can outrun Pascal when the API and drivers align. For a thin-and-light portable system, the 880M is the only option of the two; for a desk with power and cooling to spare, the GTX 1070's benchmark record is decisively stronger.