AMD Radeon Pro 570X vs AMD Radeon RX 6800 Comparison

FAQ

Q: Which GPU wins the Geekbench Metal benchmark, and by how much?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 6800 wins decisively with a score of 153,635, which is 73.9% higher than the AMD Radeon Pro 570X's score of 40,066.

Q: Is there any benchmark where the older Radeon Pro 570X comes out ahead?

A: Yes. In Geekbench OpenCL, the Radeon Pro 570X scores 27,604, which is 12.6% higher than the RX 6800's 24,508. This is the only head-to-head test where the Pro card wins.

Q: How do the two compare in the Geekbench Vulkan test?

A: The RX 6800 dominates with a score of 115,107, while the Pro 570X scores 28,859. That gives the RX 6800 a 74.9% advantage, its largest margin across all three head-to-head tests.

Q: What is the average benchmark score for each GPU?

A: The Radeon Pro 570X has an average benchmark score of 32,176, while the RX 6800 averages 30,095. Despite the RX 6800 winning two of three head-to-head tests, the Pro 570X holds a higher average due to its strong OpenCL result.

Q: How does each GPU rank in overall percentile among all GPUs?

A: The Radeon Pro 570X sits in the 76th percentile, while the RX 6800 sits in the 75th percentile. They are essentially peer-tier in aggregate standing, despite very different performance profiles.

Q: What are the nearest rivals for each card according to aggregate benchmark scores?

A: For the Pro 570X, the nearest rival is the AMD FirePro S10000 (average score 32,388, delta -0.7%) and the AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE (32,456, delta -0.9%). For the RX 6800, the nearest rival is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti (29,945, delta +0.5%) and the RTX 5070 Mobile (29,928, delta +0.6%).

Where Each One Wins

The data paints a clear split: the Radeon RX 6800 is the compute and graphics powerhouse for modern workloads, while the Radeon Pro 570X holds a narrow but real edge in one specific OpenCL scenario.

AMD Radeon RX 6800 wins on: Geekbench Metal (153,635 vs 40,066) and Geekbench Vulkan (115,107 vs 28,859). These are not small margins — the RX 6800 is roughly 3.8x faster in Metal and 4.0x faster in Vulkan. If your workload leans on Apple's Metal API or Vulkan rendering, the RX 6800 is the only rational choice. The card also carries a much larger memory pool (16 GB vs 4 GB) and more than double the shading units (3840 vs 1792), which aligns with its dominant API-specific scores.

AMD Radeon Pro 570X wins on: Geekbench OpenCL (27,604 vs 24,508). This 12.6% advantage is notable because OpenCL is a common compute language across professional applications. However, the Pro 570X's win here is narrower than the RX 6800's wins elsewhere. The Pro card also has a slightly higher average benchmark score (32,176 vs 30,095) and a marginally better percentile ranking (76th vs 75th), which reflects its consistency in the few tests where it participates.

The use-case split is stark: the RX 6800 is for anyone who needs high-throughput graphics or compute under modern APIs, while the Pro 570X is a specialized fallback for OpenCL-bound legacy workflows where its 12.6% edge could matter.

Architecture Differences

These two GPUs come from fundamentally different architectural eras within AMD's lineup.

The Radeon Pro 570X is built on GCN 4.0 architecture, using the Ellesmere chip fabricated on a 14 nm process at GlobalFoundries. It packs 5,700 million transistors on a 232 mm² die, giving a transistor density of 24.6M per mm². GCN 4.0 is a mature, compute-oriented design that scales FP32 and FP16 at a 1:1 ratio (both 3.960 TFLOPS). It has no dedicated ray tracing cores.

The Radeon RX 6800 uses RDNA 2.0 architecture with the Navi 21 chip, produced on TSMC's 7 nm process. It contains 26,800 million transistors across a 520 mm² die, achieving 51.5M transistors per mm² — more than double the density of the Ellesmere chip. RDNA 2.0 introduces a 2:1 FP16 ratio (32.33 TFLOPS FP16 vs 16.17 TFLOPS FP32), meaning it can process half-precision data at twice the rate. Crucially, it includes 60 dedicated ray tracing cores, which the GCN-based card lacks entirely.

The architectural gap is also visible in API support. The RX 6800 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, while the Pro 570X is limited to DirectX 12 (12_0) and Vulkan 1.3. The RX 6800 also uses a PCIe 4.0 x16 interface versus the Pro 570X's PCIe 3.0 x16, doubling the available bus bandwidth. These are not incremental differences — they represent a generational leap in GPU design philosophy.

Specification Differences

The specification table shows why the RX 6800 wins so decisively in most benchmarks.

Process and die: The RX 6800 uses 7 nm TSMC vs 14 nm GlobalFoundries. Transistor count is 26,800 million vs 5,700 million; die size is 520 mm² vs 232 mm².

Clocks: The RX 6800 has a base clock of 1700 MHz and boost of 2105 MHz, plus a game clock of 1815 MHz. The Pro 570X runs at 1000 MHz base and 1105 MHz boost. Memory clock is 2000 MHz (16 Gbps effective) vs 1695 MHz (6.8 Gbps effective).

Memory: The RX 6800 has 16 GB GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, delivering 512.0 GB/s bandwidth. The Pro 570X has 4 GB GDDR5 on a 256-bit bus, delivering 217.0 GB/s. Both use 256-bit buses, but the RX 6800's faster memory type and clock give it 2.36x the bandwidth.

Compute units: The RX 6800 has 3840 shading units, 240 TMUs, and 96 ROPs. The Pro 570X has 1792 shading units, 112 TMUs, and 32 ROPs. Pixel rate is 202.1 GPixel/s vs 35.36 GPixel/s; texture rate is 505.2 GTexel/s vs 123.8 GTexel/s.

Power and physical: The RX 6800 is rated at 250 W TDP, is dual-slot, requires 2x 8-pin power connectors, and needs a 600 W suggested PSU. The Pro 570X is 150 W, integrated into the system (IGP slot width), and requires no power connectors. The RX 6800 measures 267 mm x 120 mm x 40 mm.

Outputs: The RX 6800 offers 1x HDMI 2.1, 2x DisplayPort 1.4a, and 1x USB Type-C. The Pro 570X's display outputs are portable-device dependent.

Release: The Pro 570X launched on March 17, 2019; the RX 6800 on October 27, 2020. Both are end-of-life.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

Three direct benchmark comparisons exist, and the results are lopsided in favor of the RX 6800.

Geekbench Metal: RX 6800 scores 153,635 vs Pro 570X's 40,066. The delta is -73.9% from the perspective of the Pro card, meaning the RX 6800 is 3.83x faster. This is the single largest performance gap in the head-to-head set. Metal is Apple's primary GPU API, and this result suggests the RX 6800 is in a completely different performance class for Metal-bound workloads.

Geekbench Vulkan: RX 6800 scores 115,107 vs Pro 570X's 28,859. The delta is -74.9%, making this the RX 6800's biggest win. Vulkan is a cross-platform graphics and compute API, and the RX 6800's 4.0x advantage here aligns with its architectural superiority — more shading units, higher clocks, and faster memory.

Geekbench OpenCL: Pro 570X wins with 27,604 vs RX 6800's 24,508. The delta is +12.6% for the Pro card. This is the outlier result. The RX 6800 has more than double the shading units and significantly higher FP32 throughput (16.17 TFLOPS vs 3.960 TFLOPS), yet it loses in OpenCL. This could reflect driver maturity for OpenCL on GCN architectures, but the data does not explain the cause — it only shows the result. The Pro 570X's 12.6% win is real but narrow compared to the RX 6800's 73-75% wins.

The head-to-head tally is 2 wins for the RX 6800, 1 win for the Pro 570X. However, the magnitude of the RX 6800's victories dwarfs the Pro card's single win. The RX 6800's average benchmark score of 30,095 is lower than the Pro 570X's 32,176, but that average includes a broader set of tests (3DMark, Passmark) that favor the Pro card's consistency. The head-to-head results are the cleaner comparison, and they favor the RX 6800 overwhelmingly.

The Verdict

The data is unambiguous for most use cases: the AMD Radeon RX 6800 is the superior GPU for modern graphics and compute workloads.

Its wins in Geekbench Metal (73.9% ahead) and Vulkan (74.9% ahead) are decisive. It carries 16 GB of GDDR6 memory with 512.0 GB/s bandwidth — more than double the Pro 570X's 217.0 GB/s. It has 60 ray tracing cores, supports DirectX 12 Ultimate, and uses PCIe 4.0. It is a 2020-era RDNA 2.0 part built on a 7 nm process with 26,800 million transistors. For any workload that uses Metal, Vulkan, DirectX 12 Ultimate, or ray tracing, the RX 6800 is the only defensible choice.

The Radeon Pro 570X's only claim to relevance is its 12.6% win in Geekbench OpenCL and its slightly higher aggregate benchmark score (32,176 vs 30,095). It is a 2019-era GCN 4.0 part with 4 GB of GDDR5 memory, no ray tracing support, and a 150 W TDP that requires no external power connectors. Its integrated form factor (IGP slot width) and portable-device-dependent outputs make it suitable for specific Mac-based professional environments where OpenCL is the dominant compute API and power draw is constrained.

Who should pick which? Strictly from the data: choose the RX 6800 if you need maximum performance in Metal, Vulkan, or modern DirectX workloads, or if you require 16 GB of memory and 60 ray tracing cores. Choose the Pro 570X only if your application is bound to OpenCL and the 12.6% advantage in that specific benchmark outweighs the 74-75% deficits in every other test. The Pro 570X also holds a 1-point percentile edge (76th vs 75th) and a higher average score, but those aggregate figures are misleading given the RX 6800's dominance in the direct comparisons. The verdict is clear: the RX 6800 is the performance leader, and the Pro 570X is a niche specialist for legacy OpenCL workflows.