AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Comparison

The AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 occupy entirely different tiers of the graphics hardware spectrum, separated by two distinct generations and design philosophies. The data shows that while the RTX 3080 is positioned at the high end of the consumer market, the Radeon Pro Vega 16 is a low-power, integrated-class solution aimed at professional mobile workloads. Their average benchmark scores are remarkably close—23,250 for the AMD part and 23,172 for the NVIDIA part—placing both at the 68th percentile of all GPUs, yet the underlying performance characteristics, architectural resources, and feature sets could not be more divergent.

The Verdict

The benchmark data indicates that the RTX 3080 is the definitive choice for any workload requiring raw computational throughput, particularly in compute-heavy or API-specific tasks. In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the RTX 3080 achieves a score of 152,423, which is 734% higher than the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s 18,268—a delta of -88% from the latter’s perspective. This is not a marginal difference; it is a generational chasm. For any user processing large datasets, rendering complex scenes, or running GPU-accelerated applications that leverage OpenCL, the data unequivocally favors the RTX 3080.

However, the picture is less one-sided in other metrics. In Geekbench Vulkan, the RTX 3080 still wins, scoring 33,620 against the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s 21,832, but the margin narrows to 35.1%. The Radeon Pro Vega 16, despite its age and low power envelope, manages to remain competitive in Vulkan titles, suggesting that its architecture handles modern graphics APIs reasonably well. The data also shows that the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s average score of 23,250 is nearly identical to the RTX 3080’s 23,172, indicating that in aggregate, across all benchmark types, they perform at a similar level—though this is heavily skewed by the RTX 3080’s much larger set of benchmark results, which includes DirectX 9, 10, 11, and 12 tests.

The Radeon Pro Vega 16 is the appropriate pick for users constrained by power and space, as it draws only 75 W and is an IGP (integrated graphics processor) form factor, making it suitable for ultra-portable devices. The RTX 3080, conversely, requires a 320 W TDP, a dual-slot cooler, and a 700 W suggested PSU, positioning it as a desktop-only component. The data does not support any scenario where the Radeon Pro Vega 16 outperforms the RTX 3080 in a head-to-head comparison; the RTX 3080 wins both recorded head-to-head benchmarks. Thus, the verdict is clear: choose the RTX 3080 for performance, and the Radeon Pro Vega 16 only if the physical constraints of the system are paramount.

Architecture Differences

The architectural gap between these two GPUs is profound, reflecting their different release dates and market targets. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 is built on the Vega 12 chip, utilizing AMD’s GCN 5.0 architecture, and is fabricated on a 14 nm process at GlobalFoundries. Its transistor count and die size are not listed in the data, but its process node is two generations behind the RTX 3080’s 8 nm Samsung node. The RTX 3080 uses the GA102 chip, based on NVIDIA’s Ampere architecture, and integrates 28,300 million transistors on a 628 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 45.1M per mm². This density advantage is a direct consequence of the more advanced 8 nm process.

Compute resources differ drastically. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 has 1,024 shading units, 64 texture mapping units (TMUs), and 32 raster output units (ROPs). In contrast, the RTX 3080 packs 8,704 shading units, 272 TMUs, and 96 ROPs—representing an 8.5x, 4.25x, and 3x increase, respectively. The RTX 3080 also features 68 ray tracing cores and 272 tensor cores, which are entirely absent from the Radeon Pro Vega 16, enabling hardware-accelerated ray tracing and AI-based features like DLSS that the AMD part cannot perform. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 does support DirectX 12 (12_1) and Vulkan 1.3, but the RTX 3080 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, reflecting newer API feature levels.

Memory architecture is another major divergence. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 uses 4 GB of HBM2 on a 1024-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 307.2 GB/s. The RTX 3080 uses 10 GB of GDDR6X on a 320-bit bus, achieving 760.3 GB/s—2.5 times the bandwidth. Clock speeds also favor the RTX 3080, with a base clock of 1440 MHz and boost of 1710 MHz, versus the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s 815 MHz base and 1190 MHz boost. The RTX 3080’s FP32 throughput is 29.77 TFLOPS, compared to the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s 2.437 TFLOPS, a 12.2x difference. The FP16 rates are 29.77 TFLOPS (1:1) for the RTX 3080 and 4.874 TFLOPS (2:1) for the AMD part, indicating the NVIDIA card does not sacrifice FP16 performance.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU has a higher average benchmark score?

A: The AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 has an average benchmark score of 23,250, which is marginally higher than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080’s 23,172. This difference is only 0.3%, making them statistically equivalent in aggregate, despite their vastly different specifications.

Q: How do the two GPUs compare in OpenCL performance?

A: In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the RTX 3080 scores 152,423, while the Radeon Pro Vega 16 scores 18,268. The RTX 3080 is 734% faster, and the delta percentage from the AMD card’s perspective is -88%, indicating a massive performance gap in favor of NVIDIA.

Q: What is the difference in power consumption?

A: The Radeon Pro Vega 16 has a TDP of 75 W and is an IGP, meaning it is integrated into a system. The RTX 3080 has a TDP of 320 W, is a dual-slot card, and requires a 700 W suggested PSU, making it unsuitable for power-constrained or compact systems.

Q: Does the RTX 3080 support ray tracing?

A: Yes, the RTX 3080 features 68 ray tracing cores and 272 tensor cores. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 has no such hardware, as its specifications list no RT or tensor cores, meaning it cannot perform hardware-accelerated ray tracing.

Q: Which GPU has a higher memory bandwidth?

A: The RTX 3080 has a memory bandwidth of 760.3 GB/s using 10 GB of GDDR6X on a 320-bit bus. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 has 307.2 GB/s using 4 GB of HBM2 on a 1024-bit bus, which is 2.5 times lower than the RTX 3080.

Q: Are these GPUs still in production?

A: Both are listed as end-of-life in the data. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 was released on 2018-11-13, and the RTX 3080 was released on 2020-08-31, with the latter having the GeForce 20 as its predecessor and GeForce 40 as its successor.

Specification Differences

The specification table highlights the fundamental differences between the two GPUs, with the RTX 3080 dominating in nearly every metric. The Radeon Pro Vega 16 uses a 14 nm process, while the RTX 3080 uses 8 nm. The RTX 3080’s transistor count is 28,300 million, its die size is 628 mm², and its transistor density is 45.1M / mm²; none of these are listed for the AMD part. Clock speeds differ: the Radeon Pro Vega 16 has a base of 815 MHz and boost of 1190 MHz, while the RTX 3080 has 1440 MHz base and 1710 MHz boost. Memory clocks also differ, with the AMD part at 2.4 Gbps effective and the NVIDIA part at 19 Gbps effective.

Memory capacity and type vary: 4 GB HBM2 versus 10 GB GDDR6X. The bus width is 1024-bit for AMD and 320-bit for NVIDIA, but the bandwidth favors NVIDIA at 760.3 GB/s versus 307.2 GB/s. Shading units are 1,024 versus 8,704, TMUs are 64 versus 272, and ROPs are 32 versus 96. The RTX 3080 has 68 RT cores and 272 tensor cores; the AMD part has none. Pixel rate is 38.08 GPixel/s for AMD versus 164.2 GPixel/s for NVIDIA. Texture rate is 76.16 GTexel/s versus 465.1 GTexel/s. FP32 is 2.437 TFLOPS versus 29.77 TFLOPS, and FP16 is 4.874 TFLOPS (2:1) versus 29.77 TFLOPS (1:1).

The TDP is 75 W versus 320 W, and the slot width is IGP versus dual-slot. The RTX 3080 has a 1x 12-pin power connector and a 700 W suggested PSU; the AMD part lists none. The bus interface is PCIe 3.0 x16 for AMD and PCIe 4.0 x16 for NVIDIA. Display outputs differ: the AMD part is portable device dependent, while the RTX 3080 has 1x HDMI 2.1 and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a. API support differs, with DirectX 12 (12_1) versus 12 Ultimate (12_2), and Vulkan 1.3 versus 1.4. The RTX 3080’s dimensions are 285 mm length, 112 mm height, and 40 mm width; the AMD part has no listed dimensions. Finally, the RTX 3080 has a launch MSRP of 699 USD, while the AMD part has no listed launch MSRP.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head data provides only two comparison points, and the RTX 3080 wins both. The most significant victory is in the Geekbench OpenCL test, where the RTX 3080 scores 152,423 against the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s 18,268. This represents a delta of -88% from the AMD card’s perspective, meaning the RTX 3080 is over eight times faster. This result aligns with the massive differences in shading units (8,704 versus 1,024) and FP32 throughput (29.77 TFLOPS versus 2.437 TFLOPS), indicating that OpenCL workloads scale almost linearly with compute resources. For professional applications that rely on OpenCL—such as video encoding, scientific simulation, or machine learning inference—the RTX 3080 is the only viable option of the two.

The second head-to-head benchmark is the Geekbench Vulkan test, where the RTX 3080 scores 33,620 versus the Radeon Pro Vega 16’s 21,832. The delta is -35.1%, which is a substantial but less extreme margin than OpenCL. This suggests that Vulkan, being a lower-level API, allows the Radeon Pro Vega 16 to utilize its hardware more efficiently relative to its theoretical peak. The AMD GPU’s GCN architecture, despite its age, has mature Vulkan drivers that extract reasonable performance. The RTX 3080 still wins by a wide margin, but the 35.1% difference is far smaller than the 88% gap in OpenCL, indicating that the AMD part is relatively stronger in gaming or real-time graphics workloads that leverage Vulkan.

The data shows no wins for the Radeon Pro Vega 16, with the RTX 3080 claiming both victories. The nearest rivals for the Radeon Pro Vega 16 include the NVIDIA P106-100 (0% delta), AMD Radeon RX 6600M (-0.1%), and AMD Radeon R9 M290X (-0.1%), showing that its average score aligns with mid-range GPUs. The RTX 3080’s nearest rivals are nearly identical, including the same P106-100 (-0.3%) and the Radeon Pro Vega 16 itself (-0.3%), which is unusual given the RTX 3080’s raw power. This highlights a critical caveat: the average benchmark score is not representative of the RTX 3080’s actual performance in modern, demanding workloads, as it is dragged down by older DirectX tests where it scores poorly (e.g., Passmark DirectX 12 at 100). The RTX 3080’s 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 4,407 is its highest recorded result, further indicating that its average is skewed by legacy benchmarks. In contrast, the Radeon Pro Vega 16 has only three benchmark scores, all of which are consistent, making its average more reliable.