RX 5500 XT 4GB vs 8GB- Analysis

Introduction

On 12th Dec 2019, AMD released another GPU in the RX 5000 series which has two different variants. The RX 5500 XT has a 4GB and 8GB edition that are now causing a lot of confusion in choosing the right one. Not only that but the pricing makes it more difficult choosing between the RX 5500 XT and other GPUs.

In this article, let’s take a look at how they are different from each other and which variant should you buy. The RX 5500 XT is a mid-entry level graphics card that is aimed towards providing 60 fps at 1080p with high to ultra settings. This card is a little faster than the RX 580 and somewhat equivalent to the RX 590.

In case you want to watch the video instead of reading, then have a look at our video below (Video in Hindi):-

Specification

Without knowing the correct specification it will be difficult to conclude what is the main difference between the two and if there is any major factor that causes the performance difference. Take a look at the following table.

From the above, you can see that both the cards are exactly similar in specs except for the amount of VRAM they have. Their memory specs are exactly identical and whatever stream processors or compute units they have are also equal.

Unlike the GTX 1660 Super which features much higher memory specs than the GTX 1660, the RX 5500 XT variants don’t have any difference in their memory specs. Due to the presence of higher memory specs in GTX 1660 Super, it performs much faster than the GTX 1660 and competes directly with the GTX 1660 Ti which is around $50 more expensive. So, theoretically, the 8GB version of RX 5500 XT won’t be as fast as you would expect.

Performance Analysis

The comparison tests have already been done by several reviewers and we can conclude from all of those tests the results which you want. Let’s take a look at the results conducted by GamersNexus on a rig that comprised of i7 8086K, 32GB 3200MHz RAM and Asus Maximus X Hero motherboard:-

GamersNexus found out that except Shadow of The Tomb Raider, the 4gb and 8gb versions performed exactly similar or equivalent to each other. Due to this Steve Burke, The Editor-in-Chief of GN concluded that you should skip the 8GB variant and buy the 4GB.

A similar test was conducted by Techspot which is another authentic website. It tested a dozen of games to make the comparison even clearer. The test was conducted with an i9 9900K at 5GHz, 16GB 3400MHz and an unknown motherboard. Following are some of the benchmarks from their website:-

Techspot found out that RDR 2, SOTTR and COD: Modern Warfare were the games that were mostly affected by the 8GB variant and had a noticeable performance increase over the 4GB variant.

The next comparison is from PCGamesN which selected a couple of games and tested them on a rig having an i7 8700K, 16GB 3400MHz and an MSI Z390 Gaming Edge AC9900K motherboard. Here are the benchmarks:-

Here we can see that SOTTR and Assassin’s Creed Odyssey are the only two games which gain a boost in performance with the 8GB variant of RX 5500 XT.

The Reason Behind this little Difference

As we speculated earlier, the reason behind 8GB being not so fast and performing similarly in most of the games is because it doesn’t have a faster memory than the 4GB variant. Though the size has increased but the memory speed and bandwidth are exactly the same. Some games will definitely see some boost as we saw above but most of the games require up to 4GB of VRAM only to push the textures to the max at 1080p resolution.

Conclusion

If you are planning to buy the RX 5500 XT, then avoid the 8GB version and get the 4GB variant. As the pricing of the RX 5500 XT 4GB is $170 and that of the 8GB version is $200, it’s better to save $30. But note that I only recommend the 4GB variant when you only want to buy the RX 5500 XT because in case you are in a search for a good 1080p GPU, then get the GTX 1650 Super which costs $170 and even less in some of the cases, is a faster GPU than the RX 5500 XT.