The RTX 5070 faces demanding ray tracing workloads while attempting to maintain smooth 1440p gaming performance across modern titles.
The GeForce RTX 5070 targets 1440p gaming, though demanding ray tracing can push its performance. The graphics card offers several options to keep frame rates playable, including DLSS, Ray Reconstruction, and Frame Generation. But 12GB of VRAM and insufficient processing power may be a hurdle in demanding current games.
We tested the RTX 5070 on a 27-inch 1440p QD-OLED panel, with an AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D processor to minimize the CPU bottleneck. We tested various ray tracing setups in different games to see whether the GPU can deliver a fun experience.
Cyberpunk 2077 Pushes the RTX 5070 With Path Tracing
Cyberpunk 2077 is extremely demanding, especially with its Path Tracing Overdrive preset. The RTX 5070 runs DLSS Quality with Ray Reconstruction and achieves 45-50 fps in heavy areas. DLSS Balanced dips below 60 fps, but it occasionally pushes performance above 60fps. DLSS Quality has a small hit to frame rates, but a much larger hit to image quality. You don’t really want a softer, less detailed picture on a 1440p QD-OLED.
With DLSS Balanced in 2x Frame Generation mode, the displayed frame rate approaches 90 fps; however, actual performance is still 45-50 fps. Latency is 50-60 milliseconds, which makes for a decently responsive experience.
A better solution is to switch from ray tracing to standard ray tracing. Performance is comfortably over 60fps with the graphics preset set to High, ray-traced lighting to Medium, and DLSS Quality. With 2x Frame Generation enabled, performance approaches 120 fps, while latency stays around 40 milliseconds.
Resident Evil Requiem Highlights VRAM Limitations
Resident Evil Requiem also requires path tracking. With the highest graphics settings and DLSS Quality, the RTX 5070 pushes a little over 60 fps in normal scenes, but strenuous sequences can drop performance to around 40 fps. DLSS Balanced provides a performance uplift, but image quality degrades considerably. More crucially, peak settings trigger a VRAM warning, which goes away after you dial down graphics, lighting, and shadow quality.
Regular ray tracing is a much better experience. Performance is close to 80fps in demanding scenarios and around 100fps elsewhere with DLSS Quality on. The game already runs nicely; therefore, Frame Generation is mostly redundant.
Control Resonant and Assassin’s Creed Shadows Deliver Different Results
Although it was released in 2019, Control Resonant is still an incredible exhibition of ray tracing. The RTX 5070 consistently reaches near 80 fps on maxed-out graphics settings with ray tracing and DLSS Quality enabled. Updating to DLSS 4.5
Assassin’s Creed Shadows is far more challenging. Performance often holds around 55-60 fps with optimum settings, Medium ray tracing, and DLSS Quality. Turning on 2x Frame Generation brings displayed performance above 90 fps, but latency rises to almost 60 milliseconds.
Older Games and Modern Releases Show Strong Performance
The Witcher 3 runs at well over 60 fps with Ray Tracing set to Ultra and DLSS 4.5 Quality on. There’s still some glimmering in reflections because the game doesn’t use Ray Reconstruction. Death Stranding 2 also performs well, regularly hitting over 80 fps with max ray-traced ambient occlusion and reflections. Even demanding sequences tend to sit around 60 fps.
Crimson Desert is another kettle of fish. Performance without Ray Reconstruction hits about 90 fps, but reflections aren’t detailed. Ray Reconstruction improves reflections, lighting, and shadows but tanks performance below 50 fps. DLSS Performance and Frame Generation can help smooth things out, but you’ll still see notable visual softness and smearing.
Is the RTX 5070 Worth Buying for Ray Tracing?
The RTX 5070 really does ray tracing quite well at 1440p. Regular ray tracing works great on various titles, whereas path tracing is playable with moderate concessions and DLSS. The 12GB of VRAM is more than enough for most scenarios examined, although Resident Evil Requiem shows that max settings can still cause issues.
Ultimately, the RTX 5070 is a good option for gamers looking for a short-term improvement. However, if you want a graphics card that will last you longer, 12GB of VRAM can be problematic as future games become more demanding.
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