Valorant

The Intel Core i7-13700K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 delivers an exceptional Valorant experience, with the data showing frame rates that far exceed the refresh rates of even the most demanding high-end monitors. Across all tested settings and resolutions, the average FPS never dips below 428.1, indicating that this combination is overwhelmingly GPU-bound at 4K and CPU-bound at lower resolutions. The benchmark results suggest that users should prioritize high refresh rate 1440p or 1080p displays to fully exploit the system's capabilities, as the performance headroom is substantial.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data clearly indicates that the Low preset provides the highest average frame rates at every resolution, but the performance deltas between presets reveal a more nuanced picture. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves 659.4 FPS, while the Ultra preset still delivers a very high 540.6 FPS, representing a difference of 118.8 FPS. This gap narrows at 2560x1440, where Low produces 623.5 FPS and Ultra delivers 514.5 FPS, and further compresses at 3840x2160, with Low at 579.4 FPS and Ultra at 428.1 FPS.

Given that the Ultra preset at 1080p (540.6 FPS) outperforms the Low preset at 4K (579.4 FPS) by a smaller margin than the resolution scaling suggests, the optimal choice for competitive play is the Low preset at 1920x1080, as it maximizes the frame rate ceiling for the lowest latency input. However, for users with 1440p or 4K displays, the High preset is the recommended balance; it maintains 521.4 FPS at 1440p and 444.3 FPS at 4K, which are still far above the 240Hz threshold that most competitive monitors offer. The Medium preset offers marginal gains over High (531.0 vs 521.4 at 1440p) but does not justify the visual compromise, while Ultra provides the best image quality but with the lowest frame rates in the dataset.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-13700K is a 16-core, 24-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz. In Valorant, which is known for its sensitivity to single-thread performance, this CPU's architecture is a decisive factor. The benchmark data shows that the CPU's single-thread performance, as measured by 3dmark_single_thread at 1136, is strong, but the more relevant metric is the multi-threaded scaling. The 3dmark_2_threads score of 2262 indicates that even with just two threads, the processor delivers substantial throughput, which is critical for games that rely on a primary game thread and a secondary render thread.

The 30 MB of shared L3 cache and 2 MB per-core L2 cache provide a large, fast memory pool for game assets and instructions, reducing the latency of data access. The data shows that at 1080p, the frame rate difference between Low (659.4 FPS) and Ultra (540.6 FPS) is 118.8 FPS, which is a larger absolute gap than at 4K (151.3 FPS difference between Low and Ultra). This pattern indicates that at lower resolutions, the CPU is more likely to be the limiting factor, as the GPU has less work to do per frame. The CPU's 125 W TDP and unlocked multiplier suggest it is designed for sustained high-performance workloads, and the benchmark results confirm that it does not bottleneck the RTX 5070 in this game, even at the highest possible frame rates.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070, built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture, features 12 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 192-bit bus, providing 672.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's base clock is 2325 MHz, with a boost clock of 2512 MHz, and its 6144 shading units are capable of 30.87 TFLOPS of FP32 compute. In Valorant, the GPU's role becomes more pronounced as resolution increases. The data shows that at 4K, the frame rate drops from 579.4 FPS on Low to 428.1 FPS on Ultra, a 26.1% reduction, which is a more significant performance penalty than the 18.1% reduction seen at 1080p (from 659.4 FPS to 540.6 FPS).

This indicates that the RTX 5070 is the primary limiter at 4K Ultra settings, but it still maintains an exceptionally high frame rate. The 12 GB VRAM is ample for this game, as Valorant is not a VRAM-intensive title, and the 672.0 GB/s memory bandwidth ensures that texture streaming and asset loading do not cause hitches. The GPU's 83rd percentile ranking among all GPUs, based on its average benchmark score of 41687, places it in the upper tier of graphics cards, and its nearest rival data shows it is competitive with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090, which trails by 0.6%. This performance headroom means that the GPU is rarely the bottleneck in Valorant, except at the most demanding 4K High and Ultra presets.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i7-13700K and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 ranks 105th out of 1650 tested combos in the Valorant benchmark database, placing it in the top 6.4% of all systems tested for this game. This high ranking is driven by the CPU's exceptional single-thread and multi-thread performance, as well as the GPU's robust frame rendering capabilities. The CPU's average benchmark score of 47282 places it in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, and its nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-13700KF, scores 47334, a negligible 0.1% difference, confirming that the non-K variant is nearly identical in performance.

The GPU's average benchmark score of 41687 places it in the 83rd percentile of all GPUs, and its nearest rival data shows that it is 0.6% faster than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090, which is a previous-generation flagship. The combo's rank of 105 out of 1650 suggests that while there are systems with higher raw benchmark scores, very few can match the balanced performance of this pairing in Valorant. The data indicates that the system is not overkill for this game; rather, it is optimized to deliver the highest possible frame rates, which is the primary metric for competitive FPS players.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of performance degradation as resolution increases, with the most significant drops occurring at the Ultra preset. From 1920x1080 to 2560x1440, the average FPS decreases by 10.5% on Low (from 659.4 to 623.5), by 5.5% on High (from 552.5 to 521.4), by 5.5% on Medium (from 561.8 to 531.0), and by 4.9% on Ultra (from 540.6 to 514.5). This relatively small drop indicates that the CPU is still the primary driver at 1440p, as the GPU has sufficient headroom to handle the increased pixel count without significant frame rate loss.

However, from 2560x1440 to 3840x2160, the scaling becomes more pronounced. The Low preset drops by 7.1% (from 623.5 to 579.4), High drops by 14.8% (from 521.4 to 444.3), Medium drops by 11.9% (from 531.0 to 467.9), and Ultra drops by 16.8% (from 514.5 to 428.1). The larger percentage drops at the higher presets indicate that the GPU is becoming the limiting component at 4K, particularly when visual quality settings are increased. The data shows that the frame rate at 4K Ultra (428.1 FPS) is still higher than the frame rate at 1080p Ultra on many other systems, but the relative scaling suggests that users targeting 4K should stick to the High preset to maintain a more consistent frame rate above 440 FPS.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate achievable with this combo in Valorant?

A: The highest average FPS recorded is 659.4, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with the Low preset.

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

A: At the High preset, the average FPS drops from 552.5 at 1920x1080 to 444.3 at 3840x2160, representing a 108.2 FPS (or 19.6%) reduction.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU more likely to bottleneck this system in Valorant?

A: The data indicates the CPU is more influential at 1080p, where the gap between Low and Ultra is 118.8 FPS, while the GPU becomes more limiting at 4K, where the gap between Low and Ultra is 151.3 FPS.

Q: How does the RTX 5070 compare to the RTX 3090 based on benchmark scores?

A: The RTX 5070's average benchmark score is 41687, which is 0.6% higher than the RTX 3090's score of 41441, indicating the newer card is slightly faster overall.

Q: What is the combo's rank among all tested systems in the database?

A: The combo ranks 105th out of 1650 tested combinations, placing it in the top 6.4% of all systems for Valorant.

Q: Does the Ultra preset provide a playable frame rate at 4K?

A: Yes, the Ultra preset at 3840x2160 still delivers an average of 428.1 FPS, which is well above the refresh rate of any current monitor.

Measured FPS Breakdown

3840x2160 (4K):

• Low: 579.4 FPS
• Medium: 467.9 FPS
• High: 444.3 FPS
• Ultra: 428.1 FPS

2560x1440 (1440p):

• Low: 623.5 FPS
• Medium: 531.0 FPS
• High: 521.4 FPS
• Ultra: 514.5 FPS

1920x1080 (1080p):

• Low: 659.4 FPS
• Medium: 561.8 FPS
• High: 552.5 FPS
• Ultra: 540.6 FPS

The data shows a consistent ordering across all resolutions, with Low producing the highest frame rates and Ultra the lowest. The most significant performance deviation occurs at 4K, where the Ultra preset falls 151.3 FPS behind the Low preset, compared to a 118.8 FPS difference at 1080p. This suggests that the GPU's rendering load scales more steeply with resolution than the CPU's workload, making the RTX 5070 the primary factor in determining frame rates at 4K. For competitive play, the 1080p Low preset offers the highest possible frame rate, while the 1440p High preset provides a balanced experience with a 521.4 FPS average, which is still sufficient for the fastest refresh rate displays available.