AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti Comparison

AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT vs NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti is a matchup across seven years of GPU generations, and the data is unambiguous: the RX 6500 XT wins the only shared benchmark by a margin of 351.7%, while also carrying modern feature support that the GTX 560 Ti lacks entirely. The GTX 560 Ti retains a narrow advantage in one historical metric—its 256-bit memory bus versus the RX 6500 XT’s 64-bit bus—but that does not translate into any benchmark victory. For anyone choosing between these two today, the RX 6500 XT is the only rational pick for gaming, compute, or API compatibility; the GTX 560 Ti is a legacy part whose sole relevance is as a collector’s item or for testing older DirectX 11 workloads.

The Verdict

The RX 6500 XT wins decisively on every measurable benchmark in this comparison. In the only head-to-head test available (Geekbench OpenCL), the RX 6500 XT scores 48,289 against the GTX 560 Ti’s 10,690—a 351.7% advantage. That is not a close race; it is a generational gap that no architectural tweak can bridge. The RX 6500 XT also posts a PassMark G3D score of 9,608, placing it in the 51st percentile of all GPUs, while the GTX 560 Ti has no comparable DirectX 11/12 scores and sits at the 49th percentile based solely on its OpenCL result.

For gamers, the RX 6500 XT supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), Vulkan 1.4, and OpenGL 4.6, whereas the GTX 560 Ti maxes out at DirectX 12 (11_0) with no Vulkan support. That means modern titles that require DX12 Ultimate features or Vulkan will not run on the GTX 560 Ti, while the RX 6500 XT is built for them. The GTX 560 Ti’s only theoretical wins are in memory bus width (256-bit vs 64-bit) and raw memory size (1,024 MB vs 4 GB) — but the RX 6500 XT’s GDDR6 at 143.9 GB/s bandwidth exceeds the GTX 560 Ti’s GDDR5 at 128.3 GB/s, so the wider bus does not help.

The verdict is simple: pick the RX 6500 XT for any real workload. Pick the GTX 560 Ti only if you need a period-correct part for a 2011-era system or a low-cost display adapter for basic 2D tasks — its PassMark G2D score of 815 is not comparable, but the RX 6500 XT’s 815 in that same test suggests they are similar in 2D, while 3D is no contest.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU has a higher average benchmark score?

A: The RX 6500 XT averages 11,842 across all its benchmarks, while the GTX 560 Ti averages 10,690 from its single Geekbench OpenCL result. That is an 11.6% gap in the RX 6500 XT’s favor.

Q: Does the GTX 560 Ti support Vulkan?

A: No. The GTX 560 Ti lists no Vulkan support in its API specifications, while the RX 6500 XT supports Vulkan 1.4. This makes the RX 6500 XT compatible with modern Vulkan-based games and applications.

Q: What is the memory configuration difference?

A: The RX 6500 XT has 4 GB of GDDR6 on a 64-bit bus with 143.9 GB/s bandwidth. The GTX 560 Ti has 1,024 MB (1 GB) of GDDR5 on a 256-bit bus with 128.3 GB/s bandwidth. Despite the narrower bus, the RX 6500 XT delivers higher bandwidth.

Q: Which GPU has a higher boost clock?

A: The RX 6500 XT boosts to 2815 MHz, while the GTX 560 Ti has no boost clock listed — it runs at a fixed 1002 MHz memory clock with no core boost data. The RX 6500 XT’s base clock of 2310 MHz alone is more than double the GTX 560 Ti’s memory clock.

Q: Are both GPUs end-of-life products?

A: Yes, both are marked as end-of-life. The RX 6500 XT was released on 2022-01-18, and the GTX 560 Ti on 2011-01-24. Neither is in current production.

Q: What is the power connector requirement difference?

A: The RX 6500 XT needs a single 6-pin power connector and a 300 W suggested PSU. The GTX 560 Ti requires two 6-pin connectors and a 450 W suggested PSU. The RX 6500 XT’s TDP is 107 W versus 170 W for the GTX 560 Ti.

Where Each One Wins

The RX 6500 XT wins in every benchmark category where data exists. In Geekbench OpenCL, it scores 48,289 versus 10,690 — that is a 351.7% lead. For DirectX workloads, the RX 6500 XT has PassMark scores of 60 (DX10), 90 (DX11), 38 (DX12), and 108 (DX9). The GTX 560 Ti has no equivalent PassMark scores, so it cannot compete in those tests. The RX 6500 XT also has a PassMark G3D score of 9,608 and a GPU compute score of 4,456, while the GTX 560 Ti has no such results.

The GTX 560 Ti’s only nominal wins are specification-level: a wider 256-bit memory bus and a lower transistor density (5.9M / mm² vs 50.5M / mm²), which is not a performance metric. In practice, it loses the bandwidth race (128.3 GB/s vs 143.9 GB/s) and has one-fourth the VRAM (1 GB vs 4 GB). There is no workload where the GTX 560 Ti outperforms the RX 6500 XT based on available data.

For use cases, the RX 6500 XT is suited for 1080p gaming with DirectX 12 Ultimate titles, OpenCL compute tasks, and Vulkan-based software. The GTX 560 Ti is limited to older DirectX 11 games and OpenGL 4.6 applications, with no Vulkan support and half the FP32 throughput (1,263.4 GFLOPS vs 5.765 TFLOPS).

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The sole head-to-head benchmark is Geekbench OpenCL. The RX 6500 XT scores 48,289, and the GTX 560 Ti scores 10,690. That is a delta of 351.7% — meaning the RX 6500 XT is roughly 4.5 times faster in this compute test. This is not a marginal improvement; it reflects the fundamental architecture shift from Fermi 2.0 (40 nm, 1,950 million transistors) to RDNA 2.0 (6 nm, 5,400 million transistors).

No other shared benchmark exists in the data. The RX 6500 XT has ten benchmark results ranging from 38 (PassMark DX12) to 54,724 (Geekbench Vulkan). The GTX 560 Ti has only that single OpenCL score. Therefore, the head-to-head comparison is one-sided, and the RX 6500 XT wins it outright.

If we look at the RX 6500 XT’s nearest rivals for context, it is 1% behind the GTX 1080 (11,960 average) and 1.3% behind the GTX 960A (11,998), but 1.4% ahead of the GTX 1660 (11,680) and 1.9% ahead of the RX 7800 XT (11,627). The GTX 560 Ti, by contrast, sits 0.6% ahead of the RX 6600S (10,629) and 1% ahead of the R9 M275X (10,582), but 0.7% behind the Quadro K2200 (10,761) and 1.1% behind the Radeon Pro 450 (10,804). This places the GTX 560 Ti in a much lower performance tier.

Architecture Differences

The RX 6500 XT is built on RDNA 2.0 architecture (Navi 24 chip) using a 6 nm process at TSMC, with 5,400 million transistors on a 107 mm² die — a transistor density of 50.5M per mm². It has 1,024 shading units, 64 TMUs, 32 ROPs, and 16 ray-tracing cores. It supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4. Its FP32 performance is 5.765 TFLOPS, with FP16 at 11.53 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio).

The GTX 560 Ti uses Fermi 2.0 architecture (GF114 chip) on a 40 nm process at TSMC, with 1,950 million transistors on a 332 mm² die — a density of 5.9M per mm². It has 384 shading units, 64 TMUs, and 32 ROPs, but no ray-tracing cores. It supports DirectX 12 (11_0) and OpenGL 4.6, but has no Vulkan support. Its FP32 is 1,263.4 GFLOPS, with no listed FP16 capability.

Key architectural differences: the RX 6500 XT has ray-tracing hardware (16 RT cores) that the GTX 560 Ti lacks entirely. The RX 6500 XT’s transistor density is 8.6 times higher, enabling more compute per area. The RX 6500 XT also supports 4 GB of GDDR6 memory versus 1 GB of GDDR5, and its clock speeds are far higher — base 2310 MHz, boost 2815 MHz, game 2610 MHz, versus no core clocks listed for the GTX 560 Ti.

Specification Differences

| Field | AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti |

|-------|----------------------|---------------------------|

| Process Node | 6 nm | 40 nm |

| Transistors | 5,400 million | 1,950 million |

| Die Size | 107 mm² | 332 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 50.5M / mm² | 5.9M / mm² |

| Memory Size | 4 GB | 1024 MB |

| Memory Type | GDDR6 | GDDR5 |

| Memory Bus Width | 64 bit | 256 bit |

| Memory Bandwidth | 143.9 GB/s | 128.3 GB/s |

| Shading Units | 1024 | 384 |

| RT Cores | 16 | null |

| Pixel Rate | 90.08 GPixel/s | 13.17 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 180.2 GTexel/s | 52.67 GTexel/s |

| FP32 | 5.765 TFLOPS | 1,263.4 GFLOPS |

| FP16 | 11.53 TFLOPS (2:1) | null |

| TDP | 107 W | 170 W |

| Power Connectors | 1x 6-pin | 2x 6-pin |

| Suggested PSU | 300 W | 450 W |

| Bus Interface | PCIe 4.0 x4 | PCIe 2.0 x16 |

| DirectX | 12 Ultimate (12_2) | 12 (11_0) |

| Vulkan | 1.4 | null |

| Memory Clock | 2248 MHz (18 Gbps effective) | 1002 MHz (4 Gbps effective) |

| Launch MSRP | 199 USD | 249 USD |

The RX 6500 XT also has a base clock of 2310 MHz, boost clock of 2815 MHz, and game clock of 2610 MHz, while the GTX 560 Ti lists no core clocks. The GTX 560 Ti has a 229 mm length (9 inches) and dual-slot width, matching the RX 6500 XT’s dual-slot design, but with 2x DVI and 1x mini-HDMI outputs versus the RX 6500 XT’s 1x HDMI 2.1 and 1x DisplayPort 1.4a. The RX 6500 XT’s display outputs support modern standards, whereas the GTX 560 Ti relies on legacy DVI and mini-HDMI 1.3a.