NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Mobile vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Comparison

# NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Mobile vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080

The matchup between NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Mobile and the desktop GeForce RTX 3080 is a study in extremes: one is a power-sipping laptop part, the other a dual-slot desktop behemoth. Benchmark data shows the RTX 3080 wins 9 of 10 head-to-head tests, yet the mobile chip claims a stunning victory in one key API benchmark that raises questions about driver optimization and workload characteristics. The average benchmark scores tell a surprisingly close story — 23,518 for the mobile part versus 23,172 for the desktop card — but that aggregate masks dramatic per-test swings that range from a 197.5% mobile advantage to a 47.9% desktop blowout.

Where Each One Wins

The RTX 3080 dominates nearly every category that matters for traditional gaming and compute. In DirectX 12, DirectX 11, DirectX 10, and DirectX 9 tests, the desktop card leads by margins between 24% and 27.1%. The gap widens significantly in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, where the RTX 3080 scores 4,407 against the mobile chip's 2,572 — a 41.6% advantage. For compute workloads, the desktop part nearly doubles the mobile GPU's Passmark GPU Compute score, winning 14,397 to 7,504, a 47.9% lead. Even in 2D performance, the RTX 3080 is 25.7% ahead, suggesting the mobile chip's memory subsystem or clock behavior limits even basic desktop composition tasks.

The sole win for the RTX 3070 Ti Mobile comes in Geekbench Vulkan, where it scores 100,027 against the RTX 3080's 33,620 — a staggering 197.5% advantage. This outlier is difficult to explain through raw specification differences alone. The desktop card has more shading units, higher clocks, and faster memory, yet it falls to less than one-third of the mobile chip's Vulkan score. The data suggests this benchmark may be measuring something other than pure rasterization throughput, possibly related to driver scheduling, memory allocation strategies, or API-specific optimizations that favor the mobile part's configuration. Notably, in Geekbench OpenCL, the RTX 3080 reasserts dominance with a 30.4% win, so the Vulkan result is not a case of the mobile chip being generally faster in Geekbench's compute tests.

Architecture Differences

Both GPUs share the Ampere architecture and are built on Samsung's 8 nm process, but they are dramatically different silicon. The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile uses the GA104 chip with 17,400 million transistors on a 392 mm² die, while the RTX 3080 employs the GA102 with 28,300 million transistors on a 628 mm² die. Transistor density is nearly identical — 44.4M per mm² versus 45.1M per mm² — indicating the same manufacturing maturity, but the desktop chip packs 62.6% more transistors.

The compute resource gap is enormous. The RTX 3080 has 8,704 shading units, 272 texture mapping units, 68 ray tracing cores, and 272 tensor cores. The mobile chip counters with 5,888 shading units, 184 TMUs, 46 RT cores, and 184 tensor cores. Both have 96 ROPs, so pixel output rates are somewhat closer, but the desktop card still leads with 164.2 GPixel/s versus 135.4 GPixel/s. Texture rate tells a clearer story: 465.1 GTexel/s for the RTX 3080 versus 259.4 GTexel/s for the mobile part, a 79.3% difference that directly impacts fill-rate-bound scenarios.

Memory configurations diverge sharply. The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile uses 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, yielding 448.0 GB/s bandwidth at 14 Gbps effective. The RTX 3080 steps up to 10 GB of GDDR6X on a 320-bit bus, achieving 760.3 GB/s at 19 Gbps effective — a 69.7% bandwidth advantage. The desktop card's base clock of 1440 MHz and boost of 1710 MHz dwarf the mobile chip's 915 MHz base and 1410 MHz boost, though the mobile part's memory clock is actually higher at 1750 MHz versus 1188 MHz, reflecting the different memory types. Power envelopes are equally divergent: the RTX 3080 draws 320 W with a 700 W suggested PSU and a 12-pin connector, while the mobile chip is rated at 115 W with no power connectors, as it relies on the laptop's internal power delivery.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 test delivers the clearest signal of raw next-gen gaming performance. The RTX 3080's 4,407 score versus 2,572 for the mobile chip represents a 41.6% lead, aligning closely with the 79.3% texture rate advantage and 69.7% memory bandwidth edge, though the gap is smaller than those specs might predict. This suggests the mobile chip's 16.60 TFLOPS FP32 throughput, while well below the RTX 3080's 29.77 TFLOPS, still allows it to keep pace better than raw specs imply in this particular workload.

Geekbench OpenCL shows the RTX 3080 winning 152,423 to 106,022, a 30.4% margin. This compute benchmark tends to scale with shading unit count and memory bandwidth, and the desktop card's 47.9% more shading units and 69.7% more bandwidth explain the result. The Passmark suite paints a consistent picture: the RTX 3080 leads by 27.1% in DirectX 10, 26.1% in DirectX 11, 27% in DirectX 12, and 24% in DirectX 9. These margins are remarkably uniform, suggesting that across legacy and modern DirectX APIs, the desktop card maintains a similar performance ratio — likely a function of its higher clocks and larger compute footprint rather than any API-specific advantage.

The Passmark G3D score of 25,086 for the RTX 3080 versus 17,727 for the mobile chip is a 29.3% lead, roughly consistent with the DirectX results. However, Passmark GPU Compute tells a different story: the RTX 3080 scores 14,397, nearly double the mobile part's 7,504, a 47.9% gap. This compute-heavy test likely stresses FP32 throughput and memory bandwidth more than the gaming-oriented tests, explaining why the desktop card's 29.77 TFLOPS versus 16.60 TFLOPS advantage becomes more pronounced.

The Geekbench Vulkan anomaly deserves scrutiny. The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile's 100,027 score against the RTX 3080's 33,620 is not a small margin — it is a 197.5% inversion of the expected hierarchy. This result does not correlate with any architectural advantage the mobile chip holds. It is possible the benchmark was run under different driver versions, or the mobile platform's memory configuration interacts differently with Vulkan's explicit memory management. The data cannot resolve this ambiguity, but it does highlight that benchmark selection dramatically influences perceived performance.

The Verdict

The data positions the RTX 3080 as the clear performance leader for gaming and compute, with wins in 9 of 10 benchmarks and margins that reach 47.9% in compute and 41.6% in 3DMark Steel Nomad. For users who need maximum frame rates in DirectX titles, ray tracing workloads, or GPU compute tasks, the desktop card is unambiguously superior. Its 10 GB GDDR6X memory, 68 RT cores, and 29.77 TFLOPS FP32 throughput make it the choice for high-resolution gaming and professional workloads.

The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile's single Vulkan win, while spectacular, does not outweigh its consistent deficits elsewhere. However, the mobile chip's 115 W power draw versus the desktop's 320 W suggests it delivers respectable performance per watt — a factor not captured in raw benchmark scores. The near-identical average benchmark scores (23,518 versus 23,172) and similar percentiles (69th versus 68th) indicate that in a broad mix of workloads, the mobile part is far closer to the desktop card than any single test suggests. Still, the RTX 3080's launch MSRP of 699 USD and its status as an end-of-life product with a successor in the GeForce 40 series make it a historical reference point rather than a current purchase recommendation.

FAQ

Q: Which GPU wins more head-to-head benchmarks?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 wins 9 of 10 head-to-head tests, with the RTX 3070 Ti Mobile winning only the Geekbench Vulkan test.

Q: What is the largest performance gap between the two?

A: The largest gap is in Passmark GPU Compute, where the RTX 3080 leads by 47.9% (14,397 versus 7,504). The second-largest is 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 at 41.6% (4,407 versus 2,572).

Q: How does the RTX 3070 Ti Mobile manage to win the Vulkan benchmark?

A: The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile scores 100,027 in Geekbench Vulkan versus 33,620 for the RTX 3080, a 197.5% advantage that does not correlate with any architectural lead. The cause is not identifiable from the data, but it may relate to driver differences, memory management, or benchmark methodology.

Q: Are the average benchmark scores similar?

A: Yes. The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile has an average benchmark score of 23,518, while the RTX 3080 averages 23,172, a difference of 346 points. Their percentiles are also close at 69th and 68th respectively.

Q: What are the power consumption differences?

A: The RTX 3070 Ti Mobile is rated at 115 W with no power connectors, while the RTX 3080 is rated at 320 W, uses a 1x 12-pin connector, and requires a 700 W suggested PSU.

Q: Which GPU has more memory and bandwidth?

A: The RTX 3080 has 10 GB of GDDR6X on a 320-bit bus with 760.3 GB/s bandwidth, while the RTX 3070 Ti Mobile has 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus with 448.0 GB/s bandwidth.

Specification Differences

| Specification | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Mobile | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 |

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

| Chip | GA104 | GA102 |

| Process Node | 8 nm | 8 nm |

| Transistors | 17,400 million | 28,300 million |

| Die Size | 392 mm² | 628 mm² |

| Transistor Density | 44.4M / mm² | 45.1M / mm² |

| Base Clock | 915 MHz | 1440 MHz |

| Boost Clock | 1410 MHz | 1710 MHz |

| Memory Clock | 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective) | 1188 MHz (19 Gbps effective) |

| Memory Size | 8 GB | 10 GB |

| Memory Type | GDDR6 | GDDR6X |

| Memory Bus Width | 256 bit | 320 bit |

| Memory Bandwidth | 448.0 GB/s | 760.3 GB/s |

| Shading Units | 5888 | 8704 |

| TMUs | 184 | 272 |

| ROPs | 96 | 96 |

| RT Cores | 46 | 68 |

| Tensor Cores | 184 | 272 |

| Pixel Rate | 135.4 GPixel/s | 164.2 GPixel/s |

| Texture Rate | 259.4 GTexel/s | 465.1 GTexel/s |

| FP32 | 16.60 TFLOPS | 29.77 TFLOPS |

| FP16 | 16.60 TFLOPS (1:1) | 29.77 TFLOPS (1:1) |

| TDP | 115 W | 320 W |

| Slot Width | Not specified | Dual-slot |

| Power Connectors | None | 1x 12-pin |

| Suggested PSU | Not specified | 700 W |

| Display Outputs | Portable Device Dependent | 1x HDMI 2.13x DisplayPort 1.4a |

| Dimensions | Not specified | 285 mm length, 112 mm height, 40 mm width |

| Release Date | 2022-01-03 | 2020-08-31 |

| Predecessor | GeForce 20 Mobile | GeForce 20 |

| Successor | Not specified | GeForce 40 |