Radeon RX 550X vs 520

Place in performance ranking	841	562
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	1.85	2.30
Architecture	GCN 1.0 (2012−2020)	GCN 4.0 (2016−2020)
GPU code name	Oland	Lexa
Market segment	Laptop	Desktop
Release date	21 March 2017 (7 years ago)	16 December 2018 (5 years ago)
Current price	$140	$259

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

RX 550X has 24% better value for money than Radeon 520.

Detailed specifications

General performance parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. These parameters indirectly speak of performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider their benchmark and gaming test results. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores	320	512
Core clock speed	1030 MHz	1100 MHz
Boost clock speed	no data	1183 MHz
Number of transistors	1,040 million	2,200 million
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm	14 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	50 Watt	50 Watt
Texture fill rate	20.60	37.86
Floating-point performance	659.2 gflops	1,211 gflops

Form factor & compatibility

Information on Radeon 520 and Radeon RX 550X compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop video cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility). For notebook video cards it's notebook size, connection slot and bus, if the video card is inserted into a slot instead of being soldered to the notebook motherboard.

Interface	PCIe 3.0 x8	PCIe 3.0 x8
Length	no data	145 mm
Width	no data	2-slot
Supplementary power connectors	None	None

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory type	DDR3, GDDR5	GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount	2 GB	4 GB
Memory bus width	64 Bit	128 Bit
Memory clock speed	2250 MHz	6000 MHz
Memory bandwidth	16 GB/s	96 GB/s
Shared memory	-	no data

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors	1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x VGA	1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort
HDMI	+	+

API compatibility

List of supported graphics and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX	12.0	12 (12_0)
Shader Model	5.0	6.4
OpenGL	4.6	4.6
OpenCL	1.2	2.0
Vulkan	+	1.2.131

Synthetic benchmark performance

Non-gaming benchmark performance comparison. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.

Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark performance score. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

Radeon 520 2.04

RX 550X 5.82
+185%

RX 550X outperforms 520 by 185% based on our aggregated benchmark results.

Passmark

This is the most ubiquitous GPU benchmark, part of Passmark PerformanceTest suite. It gives the graphics card a thorough evaluation under various types of load, providing four separate benchmarks for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11 and 12 (the last being done in 4K resolution if possible), and few more tests engaging DirectCompute capabilities.

Benchmark coverage: 25%

Radeon 520 787

RX 550X 2249
+186%

RX 550X outperforms 520 by 186% in Passmark.

GeekBench 5 OpenCL

Geekbench 5 is a widespread graphics card benchmark combined from 11 different test scenarios. All these scenarios rely on direct usage of GPU's processing power, no 3D rendering is involved. This variation uses OpenCL API by Khronos Group.

Benchmark coverage: 9%

Radeon 520 5338

RX 550X 11337
+112%

RX 550X outperforms 520 by 112% in GeekBench 5 OpenCL.

GeekBench 5 Vulkan

Benchmark coverage: 5%

Radeon 520 4434

RX 550X 12512
+182%

RX 550X outperforms 520 by 182% in GeekBench 5 Vulkan.

Gaming performance

Let's see how good the compared graphics cards are for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in FPS.

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular games across different resolutions:

Full HD

−181%

45−50
+181%

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Low Preset

Cyberpunk 2077

4−5
−150%

10−11

+150%

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Battlefield 5	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	5−6 −180%	14−16 +180%
Cyberpunk 2077	4−5 −150%	10−11 +150%
Far Cry 5	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Far Cry New Dawn	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Forza Horizon 4	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Hitman 3	5−6 −180%	14−16 +180%
Horizon Zero Dawn	14−16 −150%	35−40 +150%
Red Dead Redemption 2	4−5 −150%	10−11 +150%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	10−12 −173%	30−33 +173%
Watch Dogs: Legion	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Battlefield 5	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	5−6 −180%	14−16 +180%
Cyberpunk 2077	4−5 −150%	10−11 +150%
Far Cry 5	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Far Cry New Dawn	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Forza Horizon 4	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Hitman 3	5−6 −180%	14−16 +180%
Horizon Zero Dawn	14−16 −150%	35−40 +150%
Red Dead Redemption 2	4−5 −150%	10−11 +150%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	10−12 −173%	30−33 +173%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	10 −170%	27−30 +170%
Watch Dogs: Legion	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	5−6 −180%	14−16 +180%
Cyberpunk 2077	4−5 −150%	10−11 +150%
Far Cry 5	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Forza Horizon 4	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Horizon Zero Dawn	14−16 −150%	35−40 +150%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	6 −167%	16−18 +167%
Watch Dogs: Legion	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%

Full HD
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

4−5
−150%

10−11

+150%

1440p
High Preset

Battlefield 5	3−4 −167%	8−9 +167%
Far Cry New Dawn	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Red Dead Redemption 2	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%

1440p
Ultra Preset

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	5−6 −180%	14−16 +180%
Cyberpunk 2077	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%
Far Cry 5	3−4 −167%	8−9 +167%
Forza Horizon 4	3−4 −167%	8−9 +167%
Horizon Zero Dawn	6−7 −167%	16−18 +167%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Watch Dogs: Legion	0−1	0−1

4K
High Preset

Far Cry 5	8−9 −163%	21−24 +163%
Horizon Zero Dawn	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	1−2 −100%	2−3 +100%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	0−1	0−1
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	0−1	0−1
Horizon Zero Dawn	2−3 −150%	5−6 +150%
Metro Exodus	4−5 −150%	10−11 +150%
Watch Dogs: Legion	0−1	0−1