Radeon HD 8970M: specs and benchmarks
Aggregated performance score
It provides poor gaming and benchmark performance at 10.01% of a leader's which is GeForce RTX 4090.
Summary
AMD started Radeon HD 8970M sales 15 May 2013. This is a laptop graphics card based on a GCN architecture and made with 28 nm manufacturing process. It is primarily aimed at gamers. 4 GB of GDDR5 memory clocked at 4.8 GHz are supplied, and together with 256 Bit memory interface this creates a bandwidth of 153.6 GB/s.
Compatibility-wise, this is card attached via PCIe 3.0 x16 interface. Power consumption is at 100 Watt.
General info
Some basic facts about Radeon HD 8970M: architecture, market segment, release date etc.
| Place in performance ranking | 412 | |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | |
| Value for money | 11.11 | |
| Architecture | GCN (2011−2017) | |
| GPU code name | Neptune | |
| Market segment | Laptop | |
| Release date | 15 May 2013 (10 years ago) | |
| Current price | $135 | of 168889 (A100 PCIe 80 GB) |
Value for money
Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.
Technical specs
Radeon HD 8970M's specs such as number of shaders, GPU base clock, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. These parameters indirectly speak of Radeon HD 8970M's performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider its benchmark and gaming test results.
| Pipelines / CUDA cores | 1280 | of 20480 (Data Center GPU Max NEXT) |
| Core clock speed | 850 MHz | of 2610 (Radeon RX 6500 XT) |
| Boost clock speed | 900 MHz | of 3599 (Radeon RX 7990 XTX) |
| Number of transistors | 2,800 million | of 14400 (GeForce GTX 1070 SLI Mobile) |
| Manufacturing process technology | 28 nm | of 4 (Radeon 780M) |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 100 Watt | of 2400 (Data Center GPU Max Subsystem) |
| Texture fill rate | 72.00 | of 969.9 (H100 SXM5 96 GB) |
| Floating-point performance | 2,304 gflops | of 16384 (Radeon Pro Duo) |
Size and compatibility
Information on Radeon HD 8970M's compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. 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.
| Laptop size | large | |
| Interface | PCIe 3.0 x16 |
Memory
Parameters of memory installed on Radeon HD 8970M: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Note that GPUs integrated into processors have no dedicated memory and use a shared part of system RAM instead.
| Memory type | GDDR5 | |
| Maximum RAM amount | 4 GB | of 192 (Radeon Instinct MI300X) |
| Memory bus width | 256 Bit | of 8192 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) |
| Memory clock speed | 4800 MHz | of 23000 (GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER) |
| Memory bandwidth | 153.6 GB/s | of 3276 (Aldebaran) |
| Shared memory | - |
Video outputs and ports
Types and number of video connectors present on Radeon HD 8970M. As a rule, this section is relevant only for desktop reference graphics cards, since for notebook ones the availability of certain video outputs depends on the laptop model, while non-reference desktop models can (though not necessarily will) bear a different set of video ports.
| Display Connectors | No outputs |
API support
APIs supported by Radeon HD 8970M, sometimes including their particular versions.
| DirectX | 12 (11_1) | |
| Shader Model | 5.1 | |
| OpenGL | 4.6 | |
| OpenCL | 1.2 | |
| Vulkan | 1.2.131 |
Benchmark performance
Synthetic benchmark performance of Radeon HD 8970M. 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.
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%
3DMark Vantage Performance
3DMark Vantage is an outdated DirectX 10 benchmark using 1280x1024 screen resolution. It taxes the graphics card with two scenes, one depicting a girl escaping some militarized base located within a sea cave, the other displaying a space fleet attack on a defenseless planet. It was discontinued in April 2017, and Time Spy benchmark is now recommended to be used instead.
Benchmark coverage: 17%
3DMark 11 Performance GPU
3DMark 11 is an obsolete DirectX 11 benchmark by Futuremark. It used four tests based on two scenes, one being few submarines exploring the submerged wreck of a sunken ship, the other is an abandoned temple deep in the jungle. All the tests are heavy with volumetric lighting and tessellation, and despite being done in 1280x720 resolution, are relatively taxing. Discontinued in January 2020, 3DMark 11 is now superseded by Time Spy.
Benchmark coverage: 17%
3DMark Fire Strike Graphics
Fire Strike is a DirectX 11 benchmark for gaming PCs. It features two separate tests displaying a fight between a humanoid and a fiery creature made of lava. Using 1920x1080 resolution, Fire Strike shows off some realistic graphics and is quite taxing on hardware.
Benchmark coverage: 14%
3DMark Cloud Gate GPU
Cloud Gate is an outdated DirectX 11 feature level 10 benchmark that was used for home PCs and basic notebooks. It displays a few scenes of some weird space teleportation device launching spaceships into unknown, using fixed resolution of 1280x720. Just like Ice Storm benchmark, it has been discontinued in January 2020 and replaced by 3DMark Night Raid.
Benchmark coverage: 14%
Unigine Heaven 3.0
This is an old DirectX 11 benchmark using Unigine, a 3D game engine by eponymous Russian company. It displays a fantasy medieval town sprawling over several flying islands. Version 3.0 was released in 2012, and in 2013 it was superseded by Heaven 4.0, which introduced several slight improvements, including a newer version of Unigine.
Benchmark coverage: 4%
Send your test results of Radeon HD 8970M.
Gaming performance
Let's see how good Radeon HD 8970M is for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in frames per second. Comparisons with game system requirements are included, but remember that sometimes official requirements may reflect reality inaccurately.
Average FPS across all PC games
Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular modern games across different resolutions:
| Full HD | 53 |
FPS performance in popular games
Full HD
Low Preset
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 16−18 |
Full HD
Medium Preset
| Assassin's Creed Odyssey | 21−24 | |
| Assassin's Creed Valhalla | 14−16 | |
| Battlefield 5 | 30−35 | |
| Call of Duty: Modern Warfare | 27−30 | |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 16−18 | |
| Far Cry 5 | 24−27 | |
| Far Cry New Dawn | 27−30 | |
| Forza Horizon 4 | 35−40 | |
| Hitman 3 | 24−27 | |
| Horizon Zero Dawn | 20−22 | |
| Red Dead Redemption 2 | 16−18 | |
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider | 21−24 | |
| Watch Dogs: Legion | 18−20 |
Full HD
High Preset
| Assassin's Creed Odyssey | 21−24 | |
| Assassin's Creed Valhalla | 14−16 | |
| Battlefield 5 | 30−35 | |
| Call of Duty: Modern Warfare | 27−30 | |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 16−18 | |
| Far Cry 5 | 24−27 | |
| Far Cry New Dawn | 27−30 | |
| Forza Horizon 4 | 35−40 | |
| Hitman 3 | 24−27 | |
| Horizon Zero Dawn | 20−22 | |
| Metro Exodus | 14−16 | |
| Red Dead Redemption 2 | 16−18 | |
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider | 21−24 | |
| The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt | 31 | |
| Watch Dogs: Legion | 18−20 |
Full HD
Ultra Preset
| Assassin's Creed Odyssey | 21−24 | |
| Assassin's Creed Valhalla | 14−16 | |
| Battlefield 5 | 30−35 | |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 16−18 | |
| Far Cry 5 | 24−27 | |
| Far Cry New Dawn | 27−30 | |
| Forza Horizon 4 | 35−40 | |
| The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt | 18 | |
| Watch Dogs: Legion | 18−20 |
1440p
High Preset
| Call of Duty: Modern Warfare | 14−16 | |
| Hitman 3 | 16−18 | |
| Horizon Zero Dawn | 16−18 | |
| Metro Exodus | 8−9 | |
| Red Dead Redemption 2 | 7−8 | |
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider | 12−14 |
1440p
Ultra Preset
| Assassin's Creed Odyssey | 9−10 | |
| Assassin's Creed Valhalla | 6−7 | |
| Battlefield 5 | 16−18 | |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 5−6 | |
| Far Cry 5 | 16−18 | |
| Far Cry New Dawn | 16−18 | |
| Forza Horizon 4 | 18−20 | |
| The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt | 9−10 | |
| Watch Dogs: Legion | 5−6 |
4K
High Preset
| Call of Duty: Modern Warfare | 7−8 | |
| Hitman 3 | 9−10 | |
| Horizon Zero Dawn | 8−9 | |
| Metro Exodus | 4−5 | |
| Red Dead Redemption 2 | 5−6 | |
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider | 5−6 | |
| The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt | 8−9 |
4K
Ultra Preset
| Assassin's Creed Odyssey | 6−7 | |
| Assassin's Creed Valhalla | 4−5 | |
| Battlefield 5 | 8−9 | |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 1−2 | |
| Far Cry 5 | 8−9 | |
| Far Cry New Dawn | 10−12 | |
| Forza Horizon 4 | 12−14 | |
| Watch Dogs: Legion | 3−4 |
NVIDIA equivalent
According to our data, the closest NVIDIA alternative to Radeon HD 8970M is GeForce GTX 580M SLI, which is faster by 1% and higher by 5 positions in our ranking.
Here are some closest NVIDIA rivals to Radeon HD 8970M:
Similar GPUs
Here is our recommendation of several graphics cards that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.
Recommended processors
These processors are most commonly used with Radeon HD 8970M according to our statistics.
