AMD Radeon Pro Vega II vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Comparison

The AMD Radeon Pro Vega II and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 represent two distinct eras of GPU design, separated by nearly six years of architectural evolution. In the only directly comparable benchmark results available, the RTX 5090 demonstrates overwhelming dominance, yet the Radeon Pro Vega II’s specialized workstation heritage and unique interface position it as a different class of product. The data reveals a massive performance gulf, but also highlights how benchmark scores must be interpreted within the context of each card’s intended ecosystem and physical design constraints.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head comparison is stark and unambiguous. In Geekbench OpenCL, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 scores 334,370 against the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II’s 99,048. This represents a delta of -70.4% for the AMD card, meaning the RTX 5090 delivers more than three times the raw compute throughput in this API. The Vulkan results follow a similar pattern: the RTX 5090 achieves 376,728 points versus the Radeon Pro Vega II’s 99,621, a -73.6% gap. These are not marginal improvements; they are generational leaps that reshape expectations for GPU compute performance.

The RTX 5090’s victory is comprehensive in these tests, but the absence of other shared benchmarks limits the analysis. The Radeon Pro Vega II’s average benchmark score across its three tests (Geekbench Metal, OpenCL, and Vulkan) is 109,617, placing it in the 94th percentile of all GPUs. The RTX 5090’s average score, however, is dragged down to 79,842 by its inclusion of lower-level PassMark DirectX tests (scores ranging from 185 to 395), which are not comparable to the Geekbench workloads. This discrepancy in average scores does not reflect real-world capability; it highlights that the RTX 5090’s percentile ranking of 92 is computed over a much broader and more diverse test suite.

Focusing strictly on the overlapping workloads, the RTX 5090’s lead is decisive. In OpenCL, the Radeon Pro Vega II sits at 29.6% of the RTX 5090’s performance. In Vulkan, that ratio drops to 26.4%. The AMD card’s performance is consistent between the two APIs (99,048 vs. 99,621), whereas the RTX 5090 shows a 12.7% advantage for Vulkan over OpenCL (376,728 vs. 334,370). This suggests the NVIDIA architecture scales better with Vulkan’s lower-level overhead, while the Vega architecture behaves similarly across both. For any workload that leverages these APIs, the RTX 5090 is not just faster; it operates in a different performance tier entirely.

FAQ

Q: How much faster is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 in Geekbench Vulkan compared to the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II?

A: The RTX 5090 scores 376,728 in Geekbench Vulkan, while the Radeon Pro Vega II scores 99,621. This gives the RTX 5090 a 73.6% performance advantage, meaning it delivers approximately 3.78 times the score of the AMD card.

Q: Does the Radeon Pro Vega II have any benchmark where it outperforms the RTX 5090?

A: No. In the head-to-head comparison, the RTX 5090 wins both tests (Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan). The Radeon Pro Vega II records zero wins in this dataset, though its Geekbench Metal score of 130,183 is notable but lacks a direct RTX 5090 comparison.

Q: What is the average benchmark score for each card, and how do their percentiles compare?

A: The Radeon Pro Vega II has an average benchmark score of 109,617 across three Geekbench tests, placing it in the 94th percentile of all GPUs. The RTX 5090’s average is 79,842 across ten tests (including PassMark variants), placing it in the 92nd percentile. The RTX 5090’s lower average is skewed by its PassMark DirectX 9-12 scores, which are not directly comparable to Geekbench results.

Q: Which card has a higher transistor density, and what does this indicate?

A: The RTX 5090 has a transistor density of 122.9M per mm², compared to the Radeon Pro Vega II’s 40.0M per mm². This 3.07x difference reflects the RTX 5090’s newer 5nm process node versus the 7nm node of the Vega 20 chip, enabling significantly more complex circuitry in a similar physical footprint.

Q: How do the memory subsystems differ between the two cards?

A: Both cards feature 32 GB of memory, but the Radeon Pro Vega II uses HBM2 with a 4096-bit bus and 825.3 GB/s bandwidth. The RTX 5090 uses GDDR7 with a 512-bit bus and 1.79 TB/s bandwidth. The RTX 5090’s bandwidth is 2.17 times higher, despite the AMD card’s wider bus, due to the newer memory technology.

Q: Are there any compatibility considerations that might affect which card a user can install?

A: Yes. The Radeon Pro Vega II uses an Apple MPX bus interface and is a quad-slot card with no standard power connectors listed. The RTX 5090 uses PCIe 5.0 x16, is dual-slot, and requires a single 16-pin power connector. The Radeon Pro Vega II is clearly designed for Apple Mac Pro systems, while the RTX 5090 targets standard PC platforms.

The Verdict

The data unequivocally favors the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 for raw performance. In both shared benchmarks, it outperforms the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II by margins exceeding 70%. The RTX 5090 also leads in specifications that drive compute throughput: its FP32 performance of 104.8 TFLOPS is 7.44 times higher than the Radeon Pro Vega II’s 14.09 TFLOPS, and its texture rate of 1,636.8 GTexel/s is 3.72 times higher. For any user prioritizing raw speed in OpenCL or Vulkan workloads, the RTX 5090 is the clear choice.

However, the Radeon Pro Vega II is not without merit. Its Geekbench Metal score of 130,183 is its strongest result, suggesting it remains competitive in Apple’s Metal API ecosystem. Its 94th percentile ranking, compared to the RTX 5090’s 92nd, indicates that in its native benchmark suite, it outperforms a higher proportion of the GPU population than the NVIDIA card does in its broader suite. The AMD card’s HBM2 memory, while slower in bandwidth, offers a 4096-bit bus that may benefit specific memory-latency-sensitive workloads. Its production status is end-of-life, but its launch MSRP of 2,199 USD was positioned for professional workstations.

The choice depends on platform and workload. Users with an Apple MPX-compatible Mac Pro system, who rely on Metal or Thunderbolt display outputs, will find the Radeon Pro Vega II as the only viable option in this comparison, regardless of its lower performance. Users with a standard PCIe 5.0 motherboard, who need maximum compute throughput or ray tracing (170 RT cores), should select the RTX 5090, which is an active product with a launch MSRP of 1,999 USD. The RTX 5090 is the performance leader, but the Radeon Pro Vega II remains relevant for its niche Apple ecosystem.

Specification Differences

The core specification gap is vast. The RTX 5090 has 21,760 shading units versus 4,096 on the Radeon Pro Vega II, a 5.31x difference. Its 680 TMUs and 176 ROPs dwarf the AMD card’s 256 TMUs and 64 ROPs. Clock speeds differ significantly: the RTX 5090 boosts to 2407 MHz, while the Radeon Pro Vega II boosts to 1720 MHz. The RTX 5090’s pixel rate is 423.6 GPixel/s versus 110.1 GPixel/s for the AMD card. Power consumption also diverges, with the RTX 5090 rated at 575 W TDP and a suggested 950 W PSU, compared to 475 W and 850 W for the Radeon Pro Vega II. The RTX 5090 is dual-slot with dimensions of 304 mm length, 137 mm height, and 40 mm width, while the AMD card is quad-slot with no listed dimensions. Display outputs differ: the RTX 5090 offers 1x HDMI 2.1b and 3x DisplayPort 2.1b, whereas the Radeon Pro Vega II provides 1x HDMI 2.0b and 4x Thunderbolt.

Architecture Differences

The architectural divergence is fundamental. The Radeon Pro Vega II uses the GCN 5.1 architecture on a 7nm TSMC process, with 13,230 million transistors on a 331 mm² die. The RTX 5090 employs Blackwell 2.0 on a 5nm TSMC node, packing 92,200 million transistors into a 750 mm² die. This represents a 6.97x increase in transistor count and a 2.27x increase in die size. The transistor density improved from 40.0M per mm² to 122.9M per mm². The RTX 5090 introduces dedicated hardware absent from the Vega 20 chip: 170 RT cores for ray tracing and 680 tensor cores for AI workloads. FP16 performance differs dramatically: the Radeon Pro Vega II achieves 28.18 TFLOPS at a 2:1 ratio, while the RTX 5090 delivers 104.8 TFLOPS at a 1:1 ratio, indicating full-rate FP16 throughput. API support also advances: the RTX 5090 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) and Vulkan 1.4, while the Radeon Pro Vega II is limited to DirectX 12 (12_1) and Vulkan 1.3. The RTX 5090 uses GDDR7 memory, whereas the Radeon Pro Vega II uses HBM2. The bus interfaces are incompatible: PCIe 5.0 x16 versus Apple MPX. Finally, the RTX 5090 is an active product with a successor planned (GeForce 60), while the Radeon Pro Vega II is end-of-life with no successor listed.