Radeon 540 vs RX 5500 XT

Place in the ranking	235	719
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	48.09	0.10
Power efficiency	12.51	4.93
Architecture	RDNA 1.0 (2019−2020)	GCN 4.0 (2016−2020)
GPU code name	Navi 14	Lexa
Market segment	Desktop	Desktop
Release date	12 December 2019 (5 years ago)	20 April 2017 (7 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	$169	$79

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

RX 5500 XT has 47990% better value for money than Radeon 540.

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores	1408	384
Core clock speed	1607 MHz	1183 MHz
Boost clock speed	1845 MHz	1124 MHz
Number of transistors	6,400 million	2,200 million
Manufacturing process technology	7 nm	14 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	130 Watt	50 Watt
Texture fill rate	162.4	28.39
Floating-point processing power	5.196 TFLOPS	0.9085 TFLOPS
ROPs	32	16
TMUs	88	24

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Interface	PCIe 4.0 x8	PCIe 3.0 x8
Length	180 mm	145 mm
Width	2-slot	1-slot
Supplementary power connectors	1x 8-pin	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	GDDR6	GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount	8 GB	1 GB
Memory bus width	128 Bit	32 Bit
Memory clock speed	14000 MHz	1500 MHz
Memory bandwidth	224.0 GB/s	24 GB/s
Shared memory	-	-

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 HDMI, 3x DisplayPort	2x DisplayPort 1.4a
HDMI	+	-

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX	12 (12_1)	12 (12_0)
Shader Model	6.5	6.7
OpenGL	4.6	4.6
OpenCL	2.0	2.1
Vulkan	1.2.131	1.3

Synthetic benchmark performance

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

Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark 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.

RX 5500 XT 23.70
+560%

Radeon 540 3.59

Passmark

This is the most ubiquitous GPU benchmark. 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.

RX 5500 XT 9129
+560%

Radeon 540 1383

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.

RX 5500 XT 44548
+627%

Radeon 540 6128

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	76 +660%	10−12 −660%
1440p	42 +600%	6−7 −600%
4K	24 +700%	3−4 −700%

Cost per frame, $

1080p	2.22	7.90
1440p	4.02	13.17
4K	7.04	26.33

FPS performance in popular games

Full HD
Low Preset

Cyberpunk 2077

78
+680%

10−11

−680%

Full HD
Medium Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	50−55 +643%	7−8 −643%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	72 +620%	10−11 −620%
Battlefield 5	75−80 +680%	10−11 −680%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	45−50 +586%	7−8 −586%
Cyberpunk 2077	61 +578%	9−10 −578%
Far Cry 5	55−60 +588%	8−9 −588%
Far Cry New Dawn	60−65 +589%	9−10 −589%
Forza Horizon 4	140−150 +567%	21−24 −567%
Hitman 3	64 +611%	9−10 −611%
Horizon Zero Dawn	110−120 +588%	16−18 −588%
Metro Exodus	132 +633%	18−20 −633%
Red Dead Redemption 2	108 +575%	16−18 −575%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	80−85 +567%	12−14 −567%
Watch Dogs: Legion	202 +573%	30−33 −573%

Full HD
High Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	66 +633%	9−10 −633%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	58 +625%	8−9 −625%
Battlefield 5	75−80 +680%	10−11 −680%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	45−50 +586%	7−8 −586%
Cyberpunk 2077	45 +650%	6−7 −650%
Far Cry 5	55−60 +588%	8−9 −588%
Far Cry New Dawn	60−65 +589%	9−10 −589%
Forza Horizon 4	140−150 +567%	21−24 −567%
Hitman 3	62 +589%	9−10 −589%
Horizon Zero Dawn	110−120 +588%	16−18 −588%
Metro Exodus	94 +571%	14−16 −571%
Red Dead Redemption 2	60−65 +589%	9−10 −589%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	108 +575%	16−18 −575%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	50−55 +643%	7−8 −643%
Watch Dogs: Legion	202 +573%	30−33 −573%

Full HD
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	50−55 +643%	7−8 −643%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	49 +600%	7−8 −600%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	45−50 +586%	7−8 −586%
Cyberpunk 2077	40 +567%	6−7 −567%
Far Cry 5	55−60 +588%	8−9 −588%
Forza Horizon 4	56 +600%	8−9 −600%
Hitman 3	55 +588%	8−9 −588%
Horizon Zero Dawn	87 +625%	12−14 −625%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	95 +579%	14−16 −579%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	58 +625%	8−9 −625%
Watch Dogs: Legion	36 +620%	5−6 −620%

Full HD
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

76
+660%

10−11

−660%

1440p
High Preset

Battlefield 5	45−50 +650%	6−7 −650%
Far Cry New Dawn	35−40 +620%	5−6 −620%

1440p
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	24−27 +733%	3−4 −733%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	37 +640%	5−6 −640%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	27−30 +575%	4−5 −575%
Cyberpunk 2077	20 +567%	3−4 −567%
Far Cry 5	27−30 +575%	4−5 −575%
Forza Horizon 4	130−140 +650%	18−20 −650%
Hitman 3	36 +620%	5−6 −620%
Horizon Zero Dawn	65 +622%	9−10 −622%
Metro Exodus	60 +567%	9−10 −567%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	66 +633%	9−10 −633%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	27−30 +625%	4−5 −625%
Watch Dogs: Legion	184 +581%	27−30 −581%

1440p
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

+600%

7−8
−600%

4K
High Preset

Battlefield 5	21−24 +667%	3−4 −667%
Far Cry New Dawn	18−20 +800%	2−3 −800%
Hitman 3	26 +767%	3−4 −767%
Horizon Zero Dawn	120−130 +578%	18−20 −578%
Metro Exodus	37 +640%	5−6 −640%
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt	31 +675%	4−5 −675%

4K
Ultra Preset

Assassin's Creed Odyssey	14−16 +600%	2−3 −600%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	19 +850%	2−3 −850%
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare	12−14 +1200%	1−2 −1200%
Cyberpunk 2077	8 +700%	1−2 −700%
Far Cry 5	12−14 +1200%	1−2 −1200%
Forza Horizon 4	21 +600%	3−4 −600%
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	38 +660%	5−6 −660%
Watch Dogs: Legion	14 +600%	2−3 −600%

4K
Epic Preset

Red Dead Redemption 2

+700%

3−4
−700%

This is how RX 5500 XT and Radeon 540 compete in popular games:

RX 5500 XT is 660% faster in 1080p
RX 5500 XT is 600% faster in 1440p
RX 5500 XT is 700% faster in 4K

Pros & cons summary

Performance score	23.70	3.59
Recency	12 December 2019	20 April 2017
Maximum RAM amount	8 GB	1 GB
Chip lithography	7 nm	14 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	130 Watt	50 Watt

RX 5500 XT has a 560.2% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 2 years, a 700% higher maximum VRAM amount, and a 100% more advanced lithography process.

Radeon 540, on the other hand, has 160% lower power consumption.

The Radeon RX 5500 XT is our recommended choice as it beats the Radeon 540 in performance tests.

Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.