AMD Radeon R9 M375 vs AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT Comparison

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The recorded data pits the AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT against the AMD Radeon R9 M375 in two direct comparisons, and the results are not close. In Geekbench OpenCL, the RX 6500 XT scores 48,289 against the R9 M375's 10,457, a delta of 361.8 percent. That is not a marginal lead; it is a generational gap made visible in raw compute throughput. The Vulkan test is even more lopsided: the RX 6500 XT reaches 54,724 while the R9 M375 manages only 9,682, a 465.2 percent advantage. Across both head-to-head benchmarks, the RX 6500 XT wins both, leaving the R9 M375 with zero victories.

Context matters here. The RX 6500 XT's average benchmark score sits at 11,842, placing it at the 51st percentile of all GPUs in the database. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080, averages 11,960, a negligible 1 percent gap. The GTX 960A is 1.3 percent ahead, while the GTX 1660 trails by 1.4 percent and the RX 7800 XT trails by 1.9 percent. So the RX 6500 XT is effectively trading blows with cards that were flagship or upper-midrange in their time. The R9 M375, by contrast, has an average score of 10,070 and sits at the 48th percentile. Its closest competitors are the NVIDIA Quadro K5100M at 10,043 (0.3 percent behind), the AMD Radeon Pro 5300M at 10,013 (0.6 percent behind), and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 870M at 9,959 (1.1 percent behind). The GTX 950A is 2 percent ahead. The R9 M375 is not a bad performer for its class, but its class is a decade older and several tiers lower.

The individual Passmark scores tell a similar story for the RX 6500 XT, though they have no counterpart for the R9 M375. The RX 6500 XT posts a Passmark G3D score of 9,608, a G2D score of 815, and a GPU compute score of 4,456. In DirectX 9 it hits 108, DirectX 10 drops to 60, DirectX 11 scores 90, and DirectX 12 falls to 38. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 result is 235. None of these numbers can be compared directly to the R9 M375, which has no such entries in the database, but they anchor the RX 6500 XT's position as a modern entry-level card that can still push respectable frames in older APIs.

The Verdict

The verdict is straightforward from the data: the RX 6500 XT is the clear choice for anyone building or upgrading a system today. It wins both head-to-head benchmarks by enormous margins, 361.8 percent in OpenCL and 465.2 percent in Vulkan. It also has a higher average benchmark score, 11,842 versus 10,070, and a higher percentile rank, 51 versus 48. The R9 M375 is an end-of-life mobile GPU from 2015, and its performance class is closer to the GTX 870M than to anything in the RX 6000 series.

However, the R9 M375 is not without a niche. If the task is legacy compatibility or a low-power mobile system where the GPU is already soldered in, then the R9 M375 can still handle basic 2D workloads and light 3D acceleration. Its OpenCL score of 10,457 and Vulkan score of 9,682 are enough for older games and productivity apps. But for any modern gaming, content creation, or compute workload, the RX 6500 XT is the only rational pick. The data does not support any scenario where the R9 M375 wins on performance.

The RX 6500 XT also has a launch MSRP of 199 USD, which is worth noting as a point of reference, though the database does not record a launch price for the R9 M375.

Architecture Differences

The two GPUs come from completely different architectural eras. The RX 6500 XT uses the Navi 24 chip built on RDNA 2.0 architecture, fabricated on a 6 nm process at TSMC. It packs 5,400 million transistors into a 107 mm² die, giving a transistor density of 50.5 million per square millimeter. The R9 M375 uses the Tropo chip based on GCN 1.0 architecture, also from TSMC but on a 28 nm process. It has 1,500 million transistors on a larger 123 mm² die, yielding just 12.2 million transistors per square millimeter. That density difference, 50.5 versus 12.2, is the single clearest indicator of how much design has advanced.

The RX 6500 XT belongs to the Navi II generation (RX 6000 series), while the R9 M375 is from the Gem System generation (R9 M300 series). The RX 6500 XT supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. The R9 M375 supports DirectX 12 (11_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.2.170. Both are end-of-life products, but the RX 6500 XT was released on 2022-01-18, while the R9 M375 came out on 2015-05-04.

The transistor counts alone show a 3.6x difference in complexity. The RX 6500 XT also has dedicated ray tracing cores, 16 of them, while the R9 M375 has none. That is a feature-level difference that no benchmark in the pack directly measures, but it matters for any game or application that uses DirectX 12 Ultimate features.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU wins in OpenCL performance?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT wins decisively. It scores 48,289 in Geekbench OpenCL, while the AMD Radeon R9 M375 scores 10,457. That is a 361.8 percent advantage for the RX 6500 XT.

Q: How much faster is the RX 6500 XT in Vulkan?

A: The RX 6500 XT scores 54,724 in Geekbench Vulkan, versus 9,682 for the R9 M375. The delta is 465.2 percent, meaning the RX 6500 XT is roughly 4.6 times faster in this test.

Q: What is the percentile ranking of each GPU?

A: The RX 6500 XT is at the 51st percentile of all GPUs in the database. The R9 M375 is at the 48th percentile. The RX 6500 XT is slightly above average, while the R9 M375 is slightly below.

Q: Are there any benchmarks where the R9 M375 wins?

A: No. In the head-to-head benchmark data, the RX 6500 XT wins both tests. The R9 M375 has zero wins.

Q: What are the closest rivals to the RX 6500 XT?

A: The nearest rivals are the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 (1 percent ahead), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960A (1.3 percent ahead), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 (1.4 percent behind), and the AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT (1.9 percent behind).

Q: What are the closest rivals to the R9 M375?

A: The nearest rivals are the NVIDIA Quadro K5100M (0.3 percent behind), the AMD Radeon Pro 5300M (0.6 percent behind), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 870M (1.1 percent behind), and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950A (2 percent ahead).

Where Each One Wins

The RX 6500 XT wins every measurable performance category in the head-to-head set. It dominates in Geekbench OpenCL and Geekbench Vulkan, and it has a higher average benchmark score across the full database. It also has a better percentile rank, 51 versus 48. The RX 6500 XT is the choice for anyone running modern games, compute workloads, or applications that leverage Vulkan or OpenCL. Its 3DMark Steel Nomad score of 235 and Passmark G3D score of 9,608 confirm that it can handle contemporary DirectX 12 titles, albeit at entry-level settings.

The R9 M375 has no benchmark wins, but it does have a qualitative niche. Its 28 nm GCN architecture is old but proven, and its 2 GB DDR3 memory on a 128-bit bus is enough for lightweight tasks. It is not a gaming GPU by today's standards, but it can serve in a legacy system or as a basic display adapter. The database shows it performing close to the GTX 870M, which means it is roughly a midrange mobile GPU from the 2014-2015 era. That is fine for older games, office work, or video playback, but not for anything demanding.

In practical terms, the RX 6500 XT is a capable air-cooled, dual-slot card with a 6-pin power connector and a 300 W suggested PSU. It uses PCIe 4.0 x4, which is a narrower bus than the R9 M375's PCIe 3.0 x16, but the newer standard more than compensates with higher bandwidth per lane. The R9 M375, being a mobile part, has no recorded slot width, power connectors, or PSU recommendation, which makes sense for a chip designed to be soldered into laptops.

Specification Differences

The specification sheets diverge on nearly every line item. The RX 6500 XT has 1,024 shading units, 64 texture mapping units, and 32 ROPs. The R9 M375 has 640 shading units, 40 TMUs, and 16 ROPs. The RX 6500 XT also has 16 ray tracing cores; the R9 M375 has none. Pixel rate is 90.08 GPixel/s for the RX 6500 XT versus 16.24 GPixel/s for the R9 M375. Texture rate is 180.2 GTexel/s versus 40.60 GTexel/s. FP32 compute is 5.765 TFLOPS versus 1,299.2 GFLOPS. The RX 6500 XT also supports FP16 at 11.53 TFLOPS (2:1), while the R9 M375 has no recorded FP16 capability.

Memory is another major split. The RX 6500 XT has 4 GB of GDDR6 on a 64-bit bus, with 143.9 GB/s of bandwidth. The R9 M375 has 2 GB of DDR3 on a 128-bit bus, with 28.80 GB/s of bandwidth. The RX 6500 XT has more than double the bandwidth despite a narrower bus, thanks to GDDR6 running at 18 Gbps effective. The R9 M375's memory runs at 1800 Mbps effective.

Clock speeds also favor the RX 6500 XT. Its base clock is 2310 MHz, boost is 2815 MHz, and game clock is 2610 MHz. The R9 M375 has a base of 1000 MHz and a boost of 1015 MHz. The process node difference, 6 nm versus 28 nm, explains much of this. The RX 6500 XT is built on a smaller node with a much higher transistor density, 50.5M per mm² versus 12.2M per mm². The RX 6500 XT's die is smaller at 107 mm², yet it carries 3.6 times more transistors than the R9 M375's 123 mm² die.

The RX 6500 XT has a TDP of 107 W, a dual-slot form factor, and a 1x 6-pin power connector. The R9 M375 has no recorded TDP, slot width, or power connectors. The bus interface differs: PCIe 4.0 x4 for the RX 6500 XT, PCIe 3.0 x16 for the R9 M375. Display outputs on the RX 6500 XT are 1x HDMI 2.1 and 1x DisplayPort 1.4a; the R9 M375 has no recorded display outputs. The RX 6500 XT also has a launch MSRP of 199 USD, while the R9 M375 has no launch MSRP recorded.