AMD Radeon RX 5600 OEM vs AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT Comparison

The Verdict

The data separates these two AMD parts cleanly by architecture and intent. The AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT is the mobile flagship of the Radeon RX 6000 series, built on RDNA 2.0, while the AMD Radeon RX 5600 OEM is a desktop-oriented RDNA 1.0 part from the Radeon RX 5000 series. Benchmark results indicate the RX 6850M XT is decisively faster in every recorded test, with an average benchmark score of 78940 against 58085 for the RX 5600 OEM. That places the RX 6850M XT in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs, while the RX 5600 OEM sits in the 87th percentile. The nearest rivals bracket the RX 6850M XT tightly: it trails the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 12 GB by 0.6%, trails the Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB by 0.8%, trails the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 by 1.1%, and leads the RTX 5090 D by 1.6%. The RX 5600 OEM sits close to the Intel Arc A570M, which is 0.3% behind, and the AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT, which is 0.5% behind, while leading the Intel Arc A580 by 0.6% and trailing the NVIDIA P102-100 by 0.8%.

Who should pick which? The RX 6850M XT is the choice for anyone who needs the highest available mobile graphics performance in this pairing, particularly for compute-heavy workloads such as OpenCL or Vulkan, where its advantages are substantial. The RX 5600 OEM is the choice only for systems that require a dual-slot desktop card with a single 8-pin power connector and a 300 W suggested PSU, where the lower 125 W TDP and smaller 6 GB memory footprint fit a more constrained platform. There is no benchmark category in the recorded data where the RX 5600 OEM wins, so performance-driven decisions should favor the RX 6850M XT without reservation.

FAQ

Q: How much faster is the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT than the AMD Radeon RX 5600 OEM in OpenCL?

A: In the Geekbench OpenCL test, the RX 6850M XT scores 85040, while the RX 5600 OEM scores 62427. That is a 36.2% advantage for the RX 6850M XT.

Q: Which GPU wins in the Vulkan benchmark?

A: The RX 6850M XT wins with a score of 99483, compared to 53743 for the RX 5600 OEM. This represents an 85.1% delta, the largest margin recorded between the two in any shared test.

Q: Are these two GPUs from the same architecture generation?

A: No. The RX 6850M XT uses RDNA 2.0 on the Navi 22 chip, while the RX 5600 OEM uses RDNA 1.0 on the Navi 10 chip. Both are fabricated on a 7 nm process at TSMC, but the architecture generations differ.

Q: Do both GPUs support ray tracing?

A: The RX 6850M XT includes 40 ray tracing cores and supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2). The RX 5600 OEM has no ray tracing cores listed and supports DirectX 12 (12_1) only.

Q: What is the memory configuration of each card?

A: The RX 6850M XT has 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus with 432.0 GB/s bandwidth. The RX 5600 OEM has 6 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus with 288.0 GB/s bandwidth.

Q: How do their transistor counts compare?

A: The RX 6850M XT packs 17,200 million transistors on a 335 mm² die, giving a density of 51.3M per mm². The RX 5600 OEM has 10,300 million transistors on a 251 mm² die, for a density of 41.0M per mm².

Architecture Differences

The architectural split is the core story. The RX 6850M XT is built on RDNA 2.0 using the Navi 22 chip, a 7 nm TSMC design with 17,200 million transistors on a 335 mm² die. The RX 5600 OEM uses RDNA 1.0 with the Navi 10 chip, also 7 nm TSMC, but with 10,300 million transistors on a 251 mm² die. The transistor density reflects the newer design: 51.3M per mm² for the RX 6850M XT versus 41.0M per mm² for the RX 5600 OEM.

Ray tracing is the clearest functional difference. The RX 6850M XT carries 40 ray tracing cores and supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), while the RX 5600 OEM has no ray tracing cores and is limited to DirectX 12 (12_1). Both GPUs support OpenGL 4.6 and Vulkan 1.4, so API-level compatibility for non-ray-traced workloads is similar.

The compute resources scale accordingly. The RX 6850M XT has 2560 shading units, 160 texture mapping units, and 64 ROPs. The RX 5600 OEM has 2048 shading units, 128 TMUs, and the same 64 ROPs. The pixel rate tells the story of clock advantage: 165.2 GPixel/s for the RX 6850M XT versus 99.84 GPixel/s for the RX 5600 OEM. Texture rate is 413.0 GTexel/s versus 199.7 GTexel/s. FP32 throughput is 13.21 TFLOPS against 6.390 TFLOPS, and FP16 is 26.43 TFLOPS (2:1) against 12.78 TFLOPS (2:1).

The RX 6850M XT is a mobile part with an IGP slot width, no power connectors, and portable-device-dependent display outputs. The RX 5600 OEM is a dual-slot desktop card with a single 8-pin power connector, a 300 W suggested PSU, and fixed display outputs of 1x HDMI 2.0b plus 3x DisplayPort 1.4a. Both use PCIe 4.0 x16.

Specification Differences

The two GPUs differ across nearly every specification field. The RX 6850M XT has a base clock of 2321 MHz, a boost clock of 2581 MHz, and a game clock of 2463 MHz. The RX 5600 OEM runs at a base clock of 1130 MHz, a boost clock of 1560 MHz, and a game clock of 1375 MHz. Memory clock also diverges: 2250 MHz with 18 Gbps effective for the RX 6850M XT, versus 1500 MHz with 12 Gbps effective for the RX 5600 OEM.

Memory capacity is double: 12 GB versus 6 GB, both GDDR6 on a 192-bit bus. Bandwidth follows the clock difference, with 432.0 GB/s for the RX 6850M XT and 288.0 GB/s for the RX 5600 OEM. Shading units, TMUs, and ROPs are 2560/160/64 versus 2048/128/64. The RX 6850M XT adds 40 ray tracing cores; the RX 5600 OEM has none.

Power and physical design differ sharply. The RX 6850M XT has a 165 W TDP, an IGP slot width, and no power connectors, reflecting its mobile integration. The RX 5600 OEM has a 125 W TDP, a dual-slot width, a single 8-pin power connector, and a 300 W suggested PSU. Display outputs are portable-device-dependent on the RX 6850M XT, while the RX 5600 OEM offers 1x HDMI 2.0b and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a. Both are end-of-life products; the RX 6850M XT released in January 2022 with a predecessor of Polaris Mobile, while the RX 5600 OEM released in January 2020 with a predecessor of Vega and a successor of Navi II.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The head-to-head data contains two recorded tests, and the RX 6850M XT wins both. In Geekbench OpenCL, the RX 6850M XT scores 85040 against 62427 for the RX 5600 OEM, a 36.2% margin. In Geekbench Vulkan, the RX 6850M XT scores 99483 against 53743, an 85.1% margin, more than double the OpenCL advantage. The Vulkan result is the standout: an 85.1% lead indicates that the RX 6850M XT is not merely faster in raw throughput, but that its RDNA 2.0 architecture extracts far better performance from the Vulkan API in this comparison.

Beyond the shared tests, the broader benchmark record reinforces the gap. The RX 6850M XT has an average benchmark score of 78940, while the RX 5600 OEM averages 58085. The RX 6850M XT also has additional recorded results: a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2257, a Geekbench Metal score of 128981, a Geekbench OpenCL score of 85040, and a Geekbench Vulkan score of 99483. The RX 5600 OEM has only OpenCL and Vulkan results in the database, so no direct comparison exists for Metal or 3DMark Steel Nomad.

Relative to their nearest rivals, the two GPUs sit in different performance strata. The RX 6850M XT trades blows with high-end NVIDIA compute cards: it is 0.6% behind the Tesla P100 PCIe 12 GB, 0.8% behind the Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB, 1.1% behind the GeForce RTX 5090, and 1.6% ahead of the RTX 5090 D. The RX 5600 OEM is closely matched with mid-range parts: 0.3% behind the Intel Arc A570M, 0.5% behind the AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT, 0.6% ahead of the Intel Arc A580, and 0.8% behind the NVIDIA P102-100. The percentile gap of 92 versus 87, combined with the average score gap of over 20,000 points, shows that the RX 6850M XT operates in a higher performance class entirely.