NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB vs NVIDIA Tesla T4 Comparison

# NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB vs NVIDIA Tesla T4

The NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB and NVIDIA Tesla T4 are both end-of-life server accelerators from NVIDIA, but they target fundamentally different workloads. In the single head-to-head benchmark available, the P100 delivers a 29.9% higher OpenCL score (79605 vs 61276), placing it in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs, while the T4 sits at the 90th percentile with an average benchmark score of 66733. The P100 is a dual-slot, 250 W board built on 16 nm Pascal; the T4 is a single-slot, 70 W board built on 12 nm Turing. Their architectural differences—HBM2 vs GDDR6, 3584 vs 2560 shading units, and the presence of tensor cores on the T4—make them suited to different roles despite their shared 16 GB memory capacity.

Head-to-Head Benchmarks

The only direct comparison available is the Geekbench OpenCL test, and it is a decisive win for the P100. The P100 scores 79605, while the T4 scores 61276, giving the P100 a 29.9% advantage. This is not a marginal gap; it is a substantial margin that reflects the P100's raw compute advantage. The P100's 3584 shading units and 9.526 TFLOPS FP32 throughput provide a much larger execution resource than the T4's 2560 shading units and 8.141 TFLOPS FP32. In practical terms, the P100 completes OpenCL workloads nearly a third faster than the T4.

The P100's nearest rivals give context to its score. It sits 0.3% above the Tesla P100 PCIe 12 GB (79396) and 0.8% above the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT (78940), but it trails the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 64X (80959) by 1.7% and the GeForce RTX 5090 (79842) by 0.3%. These deltas are small—within 2% either way—meaning the 16 GB P100 is competitive with some of the fastest cards in its class, despite being end-of-life. It is not the absolute top performer, but it is far from obsolete.

The T4's position is weaker. Its OpenCL score of 61276 puts it 1.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon VII (66004) and 2.5% ahead of the NVIDIA Tesla P40 (65095), but it trails the AMD Radeon Instinct MI25 (68562) by 2.7% and the Intel Arc A770 (68809) by 3%. The T4's average benchmark score of 66733 is 16% lower than the P100's 79605, and its percentile rank (90th vs 92nd) reflects that gap. The T4 also has a Vulkan score of 72190, which the P100 lacks, but that does not offset the OpenCL deficit.

The wins tally confirms the P100's dominance: it wins 1 benchmark, the T4 wins 0. There is no multi-core, gaming, or ray-tracing test in the data, so the analysis rests entirely on OpenCL. That said, the OpenCL result is a strong proxy for general compute throughput, and the P100's margin is large enough to be conclusive for that workload.

The Verdict

For raw compute performance, the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB is the clear choice. Its 29.9% OpenCL lead over the T4 is decisive, and its 92nd percentile ranking versus the T4's 90th percentile shows it sits in a higher performance tier overall. The P100's 250 W TDP and dual-slot design are a trade-off, but for applications that prioritize throughput over power efficiency, the P100 wins outright.

The T4, however, has its own strengths. It is a single-slot, 70 W card with no power connectors, meaning it can be deployed in dense servers where space and power are constrained. Its 320 tensor cores and 40 ray-tracing cores are features the P100 lacks entirely, making the T4 more versatile for inference workloads and real-time graphics tasks that leverage Turing-specific hardware. The T4's 12 nm process is newer than the P100's 16 nm, and its boost clock is higher (1590 MHz vs 1329 MHz), but that does not translate into a compute win.

The data supports a clear verdict: choose the P100 for brute-force FP32/OpenCL compute, choose the T4 for low-power inference or tasks that benefit from tensor cores. If you need maximum performance per watt, the T4's 70 W TDP gives it a massive efficiency advantage—it draws 72% less power (250 W vs 70 W) while delivering 85% of the P100's FP32 throughput (8.141 vs 9.526 TFLOPS). But if you need maximum absolute performance, the P100 is the only option.

There is a caveat: the T4 has a Vulkan benchmark score (72190) that the P100 does not have, and it supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2) versus the P100's DirectX 12 (12_1). For modern graphics APIs, the T4 is more future-proof. But in the OpenCL test that matters for compute, the P100 is faster by a wide margin.

FAQ

Q: Which card is faster in Geekbench OpenCL?

A: The NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB scores 79605, which is 29.9% higher than the Tesla T4's 61276.

Q: Does the Tesla T4 have any compute advantage over the P100?

A: The T4 has 320 tensor cores and 40 ray-tracing cores, which the P100 lacks, making the T4 better suited for tensor and ray-tracing workloads. However, in FP32 throughput, the P100 leads with 9.526 TFLOPS versus 8.141 TFLOPS.

Q: How do these cards compare in power consumption?

A: The P100 has a 250 W TDP and requires a 1x 8-pin power connector with a 600 W suggested PSU. The T4 has a 70 W TDP, no power connectors, and a 250 W suggested PSU.

Q: What is the memory configuration of each card?

A: Both have 16 GB, but the P100 uses HBM2 with a 4096-bit bus and 732.2 GB/s bandwidth, while the T4 uses GDDR6 with a 256-bit bus and 320.0 GB/s bandwidth.

Q: Which card has a higher percentile ranking among all GPUs?

A: The P100 is in the 92nd percentile, while the T4 is in the 90th percentile.

Q: What are the release dates for these cards?

A: The P100 was released on June 19, 2016, and the T4 was released on September 12, 2018. Both are now end-of-life products.

Specification Differences

The two cards differ across nearly every major specification. The P100 is built on a 16 nm process with 15,300 million transistors on a 610 mm² die; the T4 uses a 12 nm process with 13,600 million transistors on a 545 mm² die. The P100 has 3584 shading units, 224 TMUs, and 96 ROPs, while the T4 has 2560 shading units, 160 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. The T4 adds 40 RT cores and 320 tensor cores; the P100 has none.

The P100's base clock is 1190 MHz with a boost of 1329 MHz, while the T4's base is 585 MHz with a boost of 1590 MHz. The P100's memory runs at 715 MHz (1430 Mbps effective) with a 4096-bit bus and 732.2 GB/s bandwidth; the T4's memory runs at 1250 MHz (10 Gbps effective) with a 256-bit bus and 320.0 GB/s bandwidth. The P100 outputs 127.6 GPixel/s and 297.7 GTexel/s; the T4 outputs 101.8 GPixel/s and 254.4 GTexel/s.

The P100 is a dual-slot card measuring 267 mm (10.5 inches) with a 250 W TDP, a 1x 8-pin power connector, and a 600 W suggested PSU. The T4 is a single-slot card measuring 168 mm (6.6 inches) with a 70 W TDP, no power connectors, and a 250 W suggested PSU. Both use PCIe 3.0 x16 and have no display outputs.

Architecture Differences

The P100 uses the GP100 chip on the Pascal architecture, while the T4 uses the TU104 chip on the Turing architecture. This is a generational leap: Pascal is optimized for raw FP32 compute, whereas Turing introduces dedicated hardware for tensor operations and ray tracing. The P100's FP32 throughput is 9.526 TFLOPS, and its FP16 throughput is 19.05 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio). The T4's FP32 is 8.141 TFLOPS, and its FP16 is 16.28 TFLOPS (2:1 ratio). The T4's tensor cores and RT cores are absent from the P100 entirely, meaning the T4 can accelerate AI inference and ray-traced rendering in ways the P100 cannot.

The P100's HBM2 memory provides 732.2 GB/s bandwidth over a 4096-bit bus, which is 2.3 times the T4's 320.0 GB/s over a 256-bit bus. This makes the P100 far better for memory-bandwidth-bound workloads, such as large matrix operations or data processing. The T4's GDDR6 is slower but draws less power, aligning with its 70 W TDP. The T4's transistor density is 25.0M / mm², nearly identical to the P100's 25.1M / mm², but the T4 achieves this on a smaller, newer process node.

The T4 supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, while the P100 supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3. The P100's predecessor is Tesla Maxwell and its successor is Tesla Volta; the T4's predecessor is Tesla Volta and its successor is Server Ampere. The P100's launch MSRP was 5,699 USD; the T4 has no listed launch MSRP. Both cards are end-of-life, but the T4's newer architecture and lower power envelope make it a more modern choice for rack-scale deployments, while the P100's massive bandwidth and compute throughput keep it relevant for high-performance tasks.