Valorant

The Intel Core i7-12700KF paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti delivers exceptional performance in Valorant, with the measured data showing frame rates that far exceed the requirements of competitive play. The benchmark results across all resolutions and settings presets indicate a system that is overwhelmingly GPU-bound only at the highest settings, while at lower presets the CPU’s strong single-thread performance becomes the primary driver of the extraordinary frame rates observed. This analysis breaks down the measured FPS data, settings recommendations, and the specific roles of the CPU and GPU in achieving these results.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for Valorant with this hardware combination clearly indicates that the "Low" preset offers the highest average frame rates across all tested resolutions, making it the optimal choice for players prioritizing maximum performance. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 605 FPS, which is 98 FPS higher than the next best preset at that resolution, the Medium preset at 516 FPS. The advantage of the Low preset is consistent at higher resolutions as well: at 2560x1440 it delivers 574 FPS, and even at 3840x2160 it maintains 532 FPS, both figures representing the highest averages recorded at their respective resolutions.

The data suggests a clear hierarchy among presets, with Low > Medium > High > Ultra in terms of average FPS at every resolution tested. For instance, at 1920x1080, the Medium preset (516 FPS) outperforms High (507 FPS) by a margin of 9 FPS, while Ultra trails at 499 FPS. This pattern holds at 2560x1440, where Medium (489 FPS) edges out High (481 FPS) by 8 FPS, and Ultra sits at 473 FPS. At 3840x2160, the spread narrows: Medium (454 FPS) leads High (447 FPS) by 7 FPS, with Ultra at 439 FPS.

The Low preset’s significant lead over Medium—ranging from 78 FPS at 3840x2160 to 89 FPS at 1920x1080—indicates that the preset reduces certain graphical workloads that disproportionately impact performance in Valorant, likely related to shadow quality and post-processing effects that are computationally intensive relative to the game’s core rendering. For competitive players, the Low preset’s 605 FPS average at 1080p provides the maximum headroom above display refresh rates, ensuring that even the most demanding in-game scenarios will not cause frame drops below the threshold of high-refresh monitors.

Players who prefer higher visual fidelity without sacrificing the playable frame rate should consider the Medium preset, which still delivers 516 FPS at 1080p and 489 FPS at 1440p—figures that remain far above the 240 Hz or 360 Hz refresh rates common in esports displays. The High and Ultra presets offer diminishing returns in visual quality while costing 98 FPS and 106 FPS respectively compared to Low at 1080p, making them less suitable for competitive play but viable for casual gameplay where the minimum frame rates are still above 400 FPS in all cases.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti plays a significant role in Valorant’s performance, particularly at higher resolutions and settings, where its 16 GB of GDDR7 memory and 896.0 GB/s bandwidth provide ample resources for the game’s rendering demands. The GPU’s 8960 shading units and 70 RT cores, while not fully utilized in a competitive FPS like Valorant, contribute to the consistent frame delivery observed across all test scenarios. The boost clock of 2452 MHz ensures that the GPU can sustain high throughput, though the data suggests that at lower presets, the GPU is not the primary bottleneck.

The measured FPS differences between Low and Medium presets reveal the GPU’s workload scaling. At 1920x1080, the transition from Low (605 FPS) to Medium (516 FPS) represents a 14.7% performance drop, while the jump from Medium to High (507 FPS) is only 1.7%. This non-linear scaling indicates that the Medium preset introduces GPU-intensive effects that consume additional shading resources, while the High preset’s incremental additions have a smaller marginal cost. At 3840x2160, the same pattern emerges: Low (532 FPS) to Medium (454 FPS) is a 14.7% drop, while Medium to High (447 FPS) is 1.5%.

The VRAM capacity of 16 GB is never a limiting factor in Valorant, as even at 4K Ultra settings, the game’s texture and geometry requirements are well within the GPU’s memory allocation. The memory clock of 1750 MHz (28 Gbps effective) and 256-bit bus width provide sufficient bandwidth for the frame rates observed, with the GPU’s pixel rate of 235.4 GPixel/s enabling the high fill rates needed for 4K rendering at above 400 FPS. The data shows that the GPU’s role becomes more pronounced at 4K, where the average FPS drops by 10-19% compared to 1440p across all settings, indicating that the GPU is increasingly the limiting component at higher resolutions.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested combinations, this specific pairing of the Intel Core i7-12700KF with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti ranks 545th out of 3708 total combos for Valorant, placing it in the top 14.7% of all tested systems. This rank reflects the combination’s ability to deliver high frame rates, but it is important to note that Valorant is a game where even mid-range hardware can achieve playable performance, so the ranking is more indicative of the system’s ceiling rather than its necessity.

The CPU’s benchmark performance provides context for this ranking. The Core i7-12700KF achieves an average benchmark score of 35365, placing it in the 85th percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the Intel Core i7-13700T (score 35403, deltaPct -0.1%), the Intel Core 5 213PE (score 35428, deltaPct -0.2%), and the Intel Core i5-13600T (score 35305, deltaPct 0.2%). These rivals are remarkably close in performance, with all deltas within 0.2%, suggesting that the 12700KF is well-positioned among its peers for CPU-intensive tasks like Valorant’s game logic and physics.

The GPU’s ranking is similarly strong, with the RTX 5070 Ti achieving an average benchmark score of 49957, placing it in the 86th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT (score 50951, deltaPct -2%), the AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 (score 50001, deltaPct -0.1%), and the Intel Arc A550M (score 49737, deltaPct 0.4%). The 5070 Ti’s performance is within 2% of the RX 6900 XT, indicating that it competes with previous-generation high-end cards despite being a 50-series product. The combination of a top-15% CPU and top-14% GPU results in a system that ranks in the top 15% for Valorant, which is consistent with the measured FPS data showing frame rates in the 400-600 range.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets, with all results representing average frame rates unless otherwise noted. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 605 FPS, the highest recorded in the entire dataset. The Medium preset at this resolution delivers 516 FPS, with a minimum of 438 FPS and a maximum of 593 FPS, indicating some frame time variance but still maintaining a floor above 400 FPS. The High preset achieves 507 FPS, while the Ultra preset delivers 499 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, the Low preset averages 574 FPS, representing a 5.1% drop from the 1080p Low result. The Medium preset at 1440p averages 489 FPS, with a minimum of 416 FPS and a maximum of 563 FPS. High and Ultra presets at 1440p achieve 481 FPS and 473 FPS respectively. The performance gap between 1080p and 1440p is relatively small, ranging from 4.7% for Low to 5.2% for High, suggesting that the system has substantial headroom at these resolutions.

At 3840x2160, the Low preset averages 532 FPS, a 12.1% drop from the 1080p Low result. The Medium preset at 4K averages 454 FPS, with a minimum of 386 FPS and a maximum of 522 FPS—the only instance in the dataset where the minimum FPS drops below 400. High and Ultra presets at 4K achieve 447 FPS and 439 FPS respectively. The 4K results show a larger performance delta from 1080p compared to 1440p, with the drop ranging from 11.8% for Medium to 12.1% for High, indicating that the GPU is beginning to become a more significant bottleneck at this resolution.

Resolution Scaling

The resolution scaling behavior reveals important insights into the system’s bottleneck characteristics. From 1080p to 1440p, the average FPS drops by approximately 5% across all settings presets, which is a relatively modest decline given the 77% increase in pixel count (from 2.07 million to 3.69 million pixels). This small performance penalty suggests that at 1080p and 1440p, the system is primarily limited by the CPU’s frame generation capabilities rather than the GPU’s rendering throughput. The Core i7-12700KF’s boost clock of 5.00 GHz and strong single-thread performance, evidenced by its 3DMark single-thread score of 1043, enable it to feed the GPU with enough frames to maintain these high rates.

The transition from 1440p to 4K (3840x2160) shows a more pronounced performance drop of approximately 7-8% across all presets. For example, the Low preset drops from 574 FPS at 1440p to 532 FPS at 4K, an 7.3% decrease, while the Ultra preset drops from 473 FPS to 439 FPS, a 7.2% decrease. This larger decline indicates that at 4K, the GPU’s rendering workload becomes more significant, and the RTX 5070 Ti’s capabilities begin to influence the final frame rate more substantially. The fact that the system still exceeds 400 FPS at 4K Ultra, however, demonstrates that even at this demanding resolution, the GPU has ample headroom for Valorant’s relatively simple visual workload.

The data shows that the resolution scaling is not linear: the 1080p to 1440p drop is smaller than the 1440p to 4K drop, despite the latter representing a smaller relative pixel increase (2.25x vs 1.77x). This suggests that there is a threshold around 1440p where the GPU starts to become more relevant, but the CPU remains the dominant limiter throughout. The minimum FPS data for the Medium preset supports this: at 1080p, the minimum is 438 FPS, at 1440p it is 416 FPS, and at 4K it is 386 FPS—all remaining above the 360 FPS threshold that would be required for the fastest consumer monitors.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS achievable with this CPU-GPU combination in Valorant?

A: The highest recorded average FPS is 605, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with the Low settings preset. This represents the maximum performance the system can deliver in the measured data.

Q: How much performance is lost when moving from 1080p to 4K at the same settings?

A: The performance loss varies by preset: Low settings drop from 605 FPS to 532 FPS (12.1% decrease), Medium from 516 FPS to 454 FPS (12.0% decrease), High from 507 FPS to 447 FPS (11.8% decrease), and Ultra from 499 FPS to 439 FPS (12.0% decrease).

Q: Does the RTX 5070 Ti’s 16 GB VRAM ever become a limiting factor in Valorant?

A: No. The measured FPS data shows no evidence of VRAM-related performance drops, as even at 3840x2160 Ultra settings, the average FPS remains at 439, indicating the game’s memory requirements are well within the GPU’s 16 GB GDDR7 capacity.

Q: How does this system rank compared to other tested combinations for Valorant?

A: This combination ranks 545th out of 3708 tested combos, placing it in the top 14.7% of all systems. This ranking is consistent with the CPU’s 85th percentile and GPU’s 86th percentile benchmark scores.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded for this system, and at what settings?

A: The lowest minimum FPS recorded is 386, observed at 3840x2160 resolution with the Medium settings preset, which has a maximum FPS of 522 and an average of 454. All other tested configurations maintain minimums above 400 FPS.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU more responsible for the frame rates in Valorant?

A: The data indicates the CPU is the primary limiter at lower resolutions, as evidenced by the modest 5% FPS drop from 1080p to 1440p despite a 77% pixel increase. The GPU becomes more influential at 4K, where the FPS drop from 1440p is larger, but the CPU’s strong single-thread performance remains the dominant factor throughout.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-12700KF serves as the primary performance driver in Valorant, with its 12 cores and 20 threads providing ample processing power, though the game’s engine primarily utilizes a limited number of threads for its main simulation loop. The CPU’s base clock of 3.60 GHz and boost clock of 5.00 GHz deliver the high single-thread performance that Valorant requires, as evidenced by the system’s ability to maintain above 500 FPS at 1080p even at higher settings. The 3DMark single-thread score of 1043 and Geekbench single-core score of 2255 demonstrate the CPU’s capability in lightly-threaded workloads, which are characteristic of esports titles.

The CPU’s cache configuration, including 80 KB of L1 cache per core and 1.25 MB of L2 cache per core, along with a shared 25 MB L3 cache, helps reduce memory latency for frequently accessed game data. The 10 nm process node and Alder Lake architecture provide efficient instruction execution, with the PassMark single-thread score of 3984 indicating strong per-core performance. In terms of multi-threaded capabilities, the CPU achieves a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 28838 and a PassMark multi-thread score of 34092, though Valorant’s engine does not fully utilize all 20 threads.

The CPU’s benchmark scores place it in the 85th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 35365. Its nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-13700T, has a score of 35403, representing a negligible 0.1% difference, while the Intel Core i5-13600T scores 35305, a 0.2% difference in favor of the 12700KF. This tight clustering indicates that the 12700KF is a well-balanced mid-range processor that competes closely with newer and lower-power variants, making it a suitable choice for high-refresh-rate gaming where per-core performance is paramount.