AMD Radeon Pro Vega 48 vs NVIDIA RTX A2000 Comparison

Where Each One Wins

The recorded data splits cleanly along workload type. The NVIDIA RTX A2000 wins every head-to-head benchmark recorded in the database, while the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 48 shows no measured victory in any shared test. The two cards share only two common benchmark entries, and the NVIDIA card leads in both.

In Geekbench OpenCL, the RTX A2000 scores 67,695 against the Radeon Pro Vega 48's 53,757. That is a 20.6% advantage for NVIDIA. In Geekbench Vulkan, the RTX A2000 scores 69,089 against 57,653, a 16.6% lead. These are the only two tests where both cards appear in the same benchmark run, so the win count stands at 2 for NVIDIA and 0 for AMD.

The broader average benchmark score reinforces the pattern, though with a twist. The Radeon Pro Vega 48 posts an average benchmark score of 60,140 across all its recorded tests, while the RTX A2000 averages 46,043. The AMD card's overall average is higher because its benchmark set includes Geekbench Metal, where it scores 69,010, a result the NVIDIA card does not have recorded in the database. The RTX A2000's average is dragged down by its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1,345, a test that is not present in the AMD card's record.

The percentile ranking tells a different story. The Radeon Pro Vega 48 sits at the 88th percentile against all GPUs, while the RTX A2000 sits at the 85th. The AMD card edges out NVIDIA in overall standing, but that ranking is driven by the Metal test, which is exclusive to the AMD side of the comparison. In the tests where both cards appear, NVIDIA is consistently ahead.

For compute-heavy OpenCL workloads, the RTX A2000 is the clear pick. For Vulkan-based applications, the same conclusion holds. The Radeon Pro Vega 48's only distinct advantage appears in Apple-centric Metal environments, where its 69,010 score is the highest single benchmark result recorded for either card. That is a narrow use case, but for macOS-targeted workflows, the AMD card has a measurable edge.

The nearest rivals for each card further contextualize the results. The Radeon Pro Vega 48 sits within 2.8% of several competitors: it is 0.3% behind the Intel Arc Pro A60 and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090, 2.5% ahead of the AMD Radeon PRO V710, and 2.8% ahead of the NVIDIA P102-100. The RTX A2000, by contrast, sits within 1.2% of its nearest neighbors: 0.2% ahead of the NVIDIA RTX 5880 Ada Generation, 1% ahead of the Intel Arc A730M, and 1.2% behind both the AMD Radeon RX 5600M and the Intel Arc A530M. The NVIDIA card's average score is lower, but its head-to-head wins are decisive.

The Verdict

Benchmark results indicate that the RTX A2000 is the stronger card for cross-platform compute. It wins both shared tests by margins of 16.6% to 20.6%. Any workflow that relies on OpenCL or Vulkan performance should favor the NVIDIA card without hesitation. The data is unambiguous: two tests, two wins, no measured response from the AMD side.

The Radeon Pro Vega 48 is the better choice only if the workload is confined to Metal-based applications. Its 69,010 Geekbench Metal score is the highest single result recorded for either card in the database, and it lifts the AMD card's average benchmark score to 60,140, which is 30.6% higher than the RTX A2000's 46,043 average. For macOS users running Metal-optimized software, the AMD card's 88th percentile ranking versus the NVIDIA card's 85th suggests a meaningful advantage in that specific ecosystem.

For everyone else, the RTX A2000 is the verdict. It offers a 20.6% lead in OpenCL and a 16.6% lead in Vulkan, the two most portable compute APIs in the database. The AMD card's higher average score is a statistical artifact of the Metal benchmark, not evidence of general superiority. The head-to-head record is what matters, and it is 2 to 0 in NVIDIA's favor.

The RTX A2000 also brings hardware features that the AMD card lacks: 26 RT cores and 104 tensor cores. The database does not record ray tracing or AI workload benchmarks for either card, but the presence of those dedicated units on the NVIDIA card suggests capability beyond what the raw compute scores capture. The AMD card has no equivalent hardware listed.

The production status for both cards is end-of-life, so neither is a forward-looking purchase. But for immediate deployment in OpenCL or Vulkan pipelines, the RTX A2000 is the data-backed winner. For Metal-only environments, the Radeon Pro Vega 48 remains relevant.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The Geekbench OpenCL test is the largest margin of victory. The RTX A2000 scores 67,695 against the Radeon Pro Vega 48's 53,757. That 13,938-point gap translates to a 20.6% delta, the widest recorded difference between the two cards in any shared benchmark. The RTX A2000's shading unit count of 3,328 versus the AMD card's 3,072 partially explains the result, as does the NVIDIA card's 7.987 TFLOPS FP32 throughput against the AMD card's 7.373 TFLOPS. The NVIDIA card is 8.3% ahead in raw FP32 compute, yet it wins the OpenCL test by more than double that margin, suggesting architectural efficiency advantages beyond raw throughput.

The Geekbench Vulkan test narrows the gap slightly but still favors NVIDIA decisively. The RTX A2000 scores 69,089 against 57,653, a delta of 16.6%. The Vulkan API benefits from the NVIDIA card's newer architecture, which supports Vulkan 1.4 compared to the AMD card's Vulkan 1.3. The RTX A2000's DirectX 12 Ultimate support (12_2) versus the AMD card's DirectX 12 (12_1) also indicates a more modern feature set, though no DirectX benchmark appears in the shared test list.

The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 test appears only on the NVIDIA card's record, with a score of 1,345. The AMD card has no corresponding entry, so no direct comparison is possible. That score contributes to the RTX A2000's lower average benchmark score of 46,043, since 3DMark scores are numerically smaller than Geekbench scores, but it does not affect the head-to-head outcome.

The average benchmark scores, while not a head-to-head test, deserve scrutiny. The Radeon Pro Vega 48 averages 60,140 across three recorded tests: Metal at 69,010, OpenCL at 53,757, and Vulkan at 57,653. The RTX A2000 averages 46,043 across its three tests: 3DMark at 1,345, OpenCL at 67,695, and Vulkan at 69,089. The AMD card's average is 30.6% higher, but that is entirely due to the 3DMark score being on a different scale. In the two comparable tests, the NVIDIA card is ahead by margins that far exceed any average-score difference.

The nearest-rival data further validates the RTX A2000's standing. Its average score of 46,043 places it within 1.2% of the AMD Radeon RX 5600M and the Intel Arc A530M, both of which score 46,601 and 46,614 respectively. The Radeon Pro Vega 48's average of 60,140 places it within 2.8% of the NVIDIA P102-100, a workstation-class card. The AMD card competes in a higher average-score tier, but that tier is inflated by the Metal benchmark.

FAQ

Q: Which card wins in OpenCL performance?

A: The NVIDIA RTX A2000 wins decisively, scoring 67,695 against the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 48's 53,757, a 20.6% advantage.

Q: Which card wins in Vulkan performance?

A: The NVIDIA RTX A2000 wins again, scoring 69,089 against 57,653, a 16.6% lead.

Q: Does the AMD card have any benchmark where it beats the NVIDIA card?

A: No head-to-head win exists in the shared benchmark data. The AMD card's highest score is 69,010 in Geekbench Metal, but the NVIDIA card has no recorded Metal score to compare against.

Q: Why is the AMD card's average benchmark score higher if it loses both shared tests?

A: The AMD card averages 60,140 across its three recorded tests, while the RTX A2000 averages 46,043. The NVIDIA average includes a 3DMark Steel Nomad score of 1,345, which is numerically much lower than Geekbench scores, dragging down the average.

Q: Which card has a higher percentile ranking against all GPUs?

A: The AMD Radeon Pro Vega 48 sits at the 88th percentile, while the NVIDIA RTX A2000 sits at the 85th percentile.

Q: Does the NVIDIA card support ray tracing or AI features?

A: The RTX A2000 lists 26 RT cores and 104 tensor cores, while the AMD card lists none. No ray tracing or AI benchmarks are recorded in the database for either card.

Architecture Differences

The two cards represent fundamentally different design philosophies from different eras. The AMD Radeon Pro Vega 48 uses the Vega 10 chip on the GCN 5.0 architecture, built on a 14 nm process at GlobalFoundries. The NVIDIA RTX A2000 uses the GA106 chip on the Ampere architecture, built on an 8 nm process at Samsung. The process node difference is substantial: 14 nm versus 8 nm, which directly affects transistor density. The AMD card packs 12,500 million transistors into a 495 mm² die, yielding 25.3 million transistors per square millimeter. The NVIDIA card packs 12,000 million transistors into a 276 mm² die, yielding 43.5 million transistors per square millimeter. NVIDIA achieves nearly identical transistor counts in 44% less silicon area.

The memory architectures diverge completely. The AMD card uses 8 GB of HBM2 on a 2048-bit bus, delivering 402.4 GB/s of bandwidth. The NVIDIA card uses 6 GB of GDDR6 on a 192-bit bus, delivering 288.0 GB/s. The AMD card has 39.7% more memory bandwidth, a direct result of the HBM2 design's wide bus. The NVIDIA card compensates with a smaller, faster memory footprint that consumes less power.

The compute configurations differ in balance. The AMD card has 3,072 shading units, 192 texture mapping units, and 64 ROPs. The NVIDIA card has 3,328 shading units, 104 TMUs, and 48 ROPs. The AMD card has 84.6% more TMUs and 33.3% more ROPs, which explains its higher pixel rate of 76.80 GPixel/s versus 57.60 GPixel/s, and its higher texture rate of 230.4 GTexel/s versus 124.8 GTexel/s. The NVIDIA card has 8.3% more shading units, which drives its higher FP32 throughput of 7.987 TFLOPS versus 7.373 TFLOPS.

The FP16 capabilities reveal a major architectural split. The AMD card achieves 14.75 TFLOPS FP16 via a 2:1 rate, meaning it halves its FP32 throughput to double the FP16 rate. The NVIDIA card achieves 7.987 TFLOPS FP16 at a 1:1 rate, meaning it does not accelerate FP16 at all. For workloads that use FP16 math, the AMD card is 84.7% faster in theoretical throughput, but only if the software explicitly uses the 2:1 path.

The NVIDIA card includes dedicated hardware that the AMD card lacks entirely: 26 RT cores for ray tracing and 104 tensor cores for AI acceleration. These are not present in any form on the Radeon Pro Vega 48. The API support reflects this: the NVIDIA card supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, while the AMD card supports DirectX 12 (12_1) and Vulkan 1.3.

The NVIDIA card is built for the PCIe 4.0 interface, while the AMD card uses PCIe 3.0. Both use x16 lanes, but PCIe 4.0 doubles the per-lane bandwidth, which matters for data transfer in compute workloads.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ across nearly every major specification field in the database. The process node is 14 nm for AMD versus 8 nm for NVIDIA. The foundry is GlobalFoundries for AMD versus Samsung for NVIDIA. The transistor count is 12,500 million for AMD versus 12,000 million for NVIDIA, a 4.2% difference. The die size is 495 mm² for AMD versus 276 mm² for NVIDIA, a 44.2% reduction for NVIDIA. Transistor density is 25.3 million per square millimeter for AMD versus 43.5 million for NVIDIA.

The memory subsystem differs in every field. AMD has 8 GB of HBM2 on a 2048-bit bus with 402.4 GB/s bandwidth. NVIDIA has 6 GB of GDDR6 on a 192-bit bus with 288.0 GB/s bandwidth. The AMD card has 33.3% more memory capacity, 966.7% wider bus, and 39.7% more bandwidth.

The compute units differ in count and arrangement. AMD has 3,072 shading units, 192 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. NVIDIA has 3,328 shading units, 104 TMUs, and 48 ROPs. AMD has 84.6% more TMUs and 33.3% more ROPs. NVIDIA has 8.3% more shading units and the only RT cores (26) and tensor cores (104) in the comparison.

The clock behavior is asymmetric. The AMD card lists no base or boost clock, only a memory clock of 786 MHz with 1572 Mbps effective. The NVIDIA card lists a base clock of 562 MHz and a boost clock of 1200 MHz, with a memory clock of 1500 MHz and 12 Gbps effective. The pixel rate is 76.80 GPixel/s for AMD versus 57.60 GPixel/s for NVIDIA. The texture rate is 230.4 GTexel/s for AMD versus 124.8 GTexel/s for NVIDIA. FP32 is 7.373 TFLOPS for AMD versus 7.987 TFLOPS for NVIDIA. FP16 is 14.75 TFLOPS (2:1) for AMD versus 7.987 TFLOPS (1:1) for NVIDIA.

The power and physical characteristics differ sharply. The AMD card has no recorded TDP and is listed as an IGP (integrated graphics processor) with no power connectors. The NVIDIA card has a 70 W TDP, a dual-slot form factor, no power connectors, and a suggested PSU of 250 W. The AMD card has no recorded dimensions. The NVIDIA card measures 167 mm by 69 mm (6.6 by 2.7 inches).

The bus interface is PCIe 3.0 x16 for AMD versus PCIe 4.0 x16 for NVIDIA. Display outputs are portable-device dependent for AMD versus 4x mini-DisplayPort 1.4a for NVIDIA. The AMD card supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. The NVIDIA card supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. The release dates are 2019-03-18 for AMD and 2021-08-09 for NVIDIA, a gap of roughly two and a half years. Both cards are end-of-life. The NVIDIA card has a recorded launch MSRP of 449 USD.