Valorant

Valorant, Riot Games’ tactical FPS released on 2020-06-01T17:00:00.000Z, is notoriously CPU-bound at high frame rates. The measured combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 4600G and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 presents a fascinating case study in component bottlenecking. The data shows a 6-core, 12-thread Zen 2 processor paired with an Ada Lovelace flagship GPU, producing results that defy typical expectations for a high-end graphics card. This analysis walks through the measured FPS data, component roles, and ranking context to explain how this specific pairing behaves in Valorant.

FAQ

Q: What is the combo rank for this CPU and GPU pairing in Valorant?

A: The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 4600G and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 ranks 2622 out of 3708 tested combos in Valorant. This places it in the lower 30th percentile of all tested configurations, indicating that despite the powerful GPU, the overall system performance is held back significantly by the processor.

Q: How much faster is the Low preset compared to the Ultra preset at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average FPS of 403, while the Ultra preset averages 332 FPS. The difference is 71 FPS, meaning the Low preset is approximately 21% faster than Ultra. This gap narrows slightly at higher resolutions, with a 62 FPS difference at 2560x1440 and a 62 FPS difference at 3840x2160.

Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded across all tested settings and resolutions?

A: The highest average FPS in the measured data is 403, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with the Low settings preset. The second-highest is 382 FPS at 2560x1440 with Low settings, followed by 354 FPS at 3840x2160 with Low settings. All other settings presets at any resolution fall below 350 FPS.

Q: How does the Ryzen 5 4600G’s single-thread performance compare to its multi-thread performance?

A: The benchmark data shows a significant gap between single-thread and multi-thread scores. The Cinebench R23 single-core score is 1919, while the multi-core score is 13593. This represents a ratio of approximately 7.1x for multi-core over single-core, which is consistent with a 6-core/12-thread processor. The 3DMark single-thread score is 726, while the max-threads score is 4889.

Q: Does the RTX 4080’s 16 GB of VRAM become a limiting factor in Valorant?

A: No, the data indicates that VRAM is not a limiting factor. The RTX 4080 has 16 GB of GDDR6X memory with a 256-bit bus, but Valorant is a lightweight esports title. The measured FPS at 4K Ultra (292 avg) is still extremely high, and the performance scaling from 1080p to 4K (a 71 FPS drop on Low, from 403 to 354) is relatively modest, suggesting the game is not memory-bandwidth or capacity constrained.

Q: What is the average benchmark score percentile for the RTX 4080 compared to all GPUs?

A: The RTX 4080 has a percentileVsAllGpus of 86, meaning it performs better than 86% of all GPUs in the benchmark database. Its average benchmark score is 54247. This high percentile contrasts sharply with the CPU’s 71st percentile ranking, illustrating the performance mismatch between the two components.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 is the dominant component in this pairing by raw specification. Its role in Valorant is theoretically to render frames as fast as possible, but the measured data suggests it is frequently waiting on the CPU. The GPU’s architecture is Ada Lovelace, built on a 5 nm process at TSMC, with a base clock of 2205 MHz and a boost clock of 2505 MHz. The memory configuration consists of 16 GB of GDDR6X on a 256-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 716.8 GB/s.

Given the RTX 4080’s compute capabilities — 9728 shading units, 304 TMUs, and 112 ROPs — the GPU is capable of massive throughput. The pixel rate is 280.6 GPixel/s and the texture rate is 761.5 GTexel/s, with FP32 performance of 48.74 TFLOPS. In Valorant, which is not graphically intensive by modern standards, these specifications should allow for extremely high frame rates. However, the measured results show that increasing resolution from 1080p to 4K only reduces the average FPS by a relatively small amount (e.g., from 403 to 354 on Low settings). This small drop indicates that the GPU is not the primary bottleneck; if it were, the 4K performance would degrade far more significantly due to the 4x pixel count increase.

The GPU’s percentileVsAllGpus is 86, with an avgBenchmarkScore of 54247. Its nearest rivals include the RTX 4080 SUPER (avgScore 54209, deltaPct 0.1) and the AMD Radeon Pro W5700X (avgScore 54828, deltaPct -1.1). In a synthetic benchmark context, the RTX 4080 is essentially on par with these cards. Yet in this Valorant test, the GPU’s potential is unrealized due to the CPU constraint. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 6567 confirms the GPU’s strength in synthetic workloads, but the game’s frame pacing is dictated by the processor’s ability to feed draw calls.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of CPU limitation through resolution scaling. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the average FPS is 403. Moving to 2560x1440, the average drops to 382 FPS, and at 3840x2160, it falls to 354 FPS. The total reduction from 1080p to 4K is 49 FPS, or roughly 12%. For a GPU-bound scenario, one would expect a much steeper decline — often 40-50% or more — when pixel count quadruples.

The High settings preset shows a similar trend: 338 FPS at 1080p, 320 FPS at 1440p, and 297 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 4K is 41 FPS (12%). The Medium preset shows 343 FPS at 1080p, 326 FPS at 1440p, and 302 FPS at 4K. The Ultra preset shows 332 FPS at 1080p, 315 FPS at 1440p, and 292 FPS at 4K. Across all settings, the relative performance loss from 1080p to 4K is consistently around 12-14%.

This consistency is the signature of a CPU bottleneck. The Ryzen 5 4600G is the limiting factor, and the GPU has ample headroom even at 4K. The data suggests that the RTX 4080 is not being fully utilized at any resolution tested. The fact that the Low preset at 4K (354 FPS) outperforms the Ultra preset at 1080p (332 FPS) further underscores that settings and resolution have less impact than the CPU’s frame generation ceiling. The game is likely spending most of its time waiting for the CPU to process game logic and submit draw calls, rather than waiting for the GPU to rasterize pixels.

How This Combo Ranks

The comboRankInGame for this specific pairing is 2622 out of 3708 total tested combinations. This rank of 2622 places it in the 29th percentile (calculated as 2622/3708). This is a surprisingly low rank given the RTX 4080’s position in the GPU hierarchy (86th percentile). The Ryzen 5 4600G’s percentileVsAllCpus is 71, which is also respectable, but the combination underperforms relative to what each component’s individual percentile might suggest.

The data indicates that many other CPU+GPU combinations outperform this pairing in Valorant. The bottleneck is clearly the CPU, as a stronger processor paired with a weaker GPU would likely achieve higher frame rates in this title. The Ryzen 5 4600G has an avgBenchmarkScore of 17507, which is close to its nearest rivals. The AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 5355GE has an avgScore of 17482 (deltaPct 0.1), the AMD Ryzen 3 8300GE has 17614 (deltaPct -0.6), the Intel Core 7 150U has 17395 (deltaPct 0.6), and the Intel Core i3-14100T has 17648 (deltaPct -0.8). These rivals are all within 1% of the 4600G’s synthetic CPU score, yet the 4600G’s gaming performance in this combo is limited by its architecture.

The rank of 2622 suggests that users with this combo are leaving significant performance on the table. In a game like Valorant, where high refresh rate monitors (144Hz, 240Hz, or higher) are common, the inability to push past 400 FPS on Low settings might not be a practical issue, but the ranking shows that the CPU is the clear weak link. The combo sits in the bottom third of all tested configurations, which is unexpected for a system with an RTX 4080.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 4600G is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 2 architecture, codenamed Renoir. It has a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 4.20 GHz, with a TDP of 65W. The cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 per core, 512 KB of L2 per core, and 8 MB of shared L3 cache. The processor supports DDR4 memory on a dual-channel bus, with a maximum memory bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s. It has integrated Radeon Vega 7 graphics, but in this configuration, the discrete RTX 4080 is used.

In Valorant, CPU performance is critical because the game engine relies heavily on single-threaded draw call submission and game logic. The 4600G’s benchmark scores show moderate single-thread performance: 3DMark single-thread score of 726, Cinebench R15 single-core of 193, R20 single-core of 805, and R23 single-core of 1919. Geekbench single-core is 1460. These scores are not terrible, but they lag behind modern high-end desktop CPUs.

The multi-thread scores are more robust: Cinebench R23 multi-core of 13593, Geekbench multi-core of 6637, and 3DMark max-threads of 4889. However, Valorant’s performance is typically limited by single-core speed and memory latency rather than raw multi-core throughput. The 8 MB of L3 cache is also relatively small compared to newer processors, which can impact game performance.

The CPU’s avgBenchmarkScore is 17507, placing it in the 71st percentile of all CPUs. This is a mid-range result. The nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 5355GE (avgScore 17482, deltaPct 0.1) and the Intel Core 7 150U (avgScore 17395, deltaPct 0.6). None of these rivals are known for exceptional gaming performance. The data suggests that the CPU’s ability to feed the RTX 4080 is the primary constraint, as evidenced by the relatively flat FPS scaling across resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. All figures are average FPS unless otherwise noted.

At 3840x2160 (4K), the results are as follows:

• Low: 354 FPS
• Medium: 302 FPS (min 257, max 347)
• High: 297 FPS
• Ultra: 292 FPS

The spread from Low to Ultra is 62 FPS, with Ultra being 17.5% slower than Low. The Medium preset’s min FPS of 257 suggests some frame pacing variance, but the average remains high.

At 2560x1440 (1440p):

• Low: 382 FPS
• Medium: 326 FPS (min 277, max 374)
• High: 320 FPS
• Ultra: 315 FPS

The spread is 67 FPS from Low to Ultra. The Medium preset shows a min of 277 and max of 374, indicating a 97 FPS range. This is the largest variance in the dataset, suggesting occasional CPU hitches.

At 1920x1080 (1080p):

• Low: 403 FPS
• Medium: 343 FPS (min 292, max 395)
• High: 338 FPS
• Ultra: 332 FPS

The spread is 71 FPS from Low to Ultra. The Medium preset min of 292 is notable, as it is lower than the average FPS of several other settings at higher resolutions. This indicates that even at 1080p, the CPU can cause frame drops below 300 FPS.

The data shows a clear hierarchy: Low settings always yield the highest FPS, followed by Medium, then High, and finally Ultra. The differences between Medium, High, and Ultra are relatively small (e.g., at 1080p: 343 vs 338 vs 332 FPS), suggesting that the game’s higher settings have a minimal impact on GPU load compared to the CPU bottleneck. The maximum FPS recorded is 403 (1080p Low), and the minimum average FPS is 292 (4K Ultra).

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings preset for this combination depends on the target resolution and refresh rate. For users with a 1080p 240Hz or 360Hz monitor, the Low preset is the only option that consistently exceeds 400 FPS. The Medium preset at 1080p averages 343 FPS, which is still above 300 FPS but may not fully saturate a 360Hz display. High and Ultra presets at 1080p average 338 and 332 FPS, respectively, which are nearly identical and would be suitable for 240Hz monitors.

At 1440p, the Low preset averages 382 FPS, which is excellent for 360Hz panels. The Medium preset at 326 FPS is suitable for 240Hz, while High (320 FPS) and Ultra (315 FPS) are also above 300 FPS. The differences between Medium, High, and Ultra at 1440p are negligible (6-11 FPS), so users can choose the highest visual fidelity without a meaningful FPS penalty.

At 4K, all presets deliver high frame rates, with Low at 354 FPS and Ultra at 292 FPS. This is more than sufficient for any current high-refresh-rate 4K monitor, which typically maxes out at 144Hz or 240Hz. The Medium preset at 302 FPS offers a good balance, but the Low preset’s 354 FPS provides more headroom for frame time consistency.

Given the CPU bottleneck, the recommendation is to prioritize the Low preset at 1080p and 1440p if maximum FPS is the goal. For 4K, the Ultra preset is perfectly playable and offers the best image quality without dropping below 292 FPS. The Medium preset shows the most frame time variance (e.g., min 292 at 1080p), so users seeking consistent pacing might prefer Low or High. Ultimately, the data suggests that any settings preset will provide a smooth experience, but Low settings unlock the highest possible frame rates to match the most demanding refresh rates.