Radeon R9 280 vs Radeon R9 280X

If you are going to buy a new graphics card and are choosing between Radeon R9 280 and Radeon R9 280X, there are a couple of things to consider. Cards with more VRAM in general perform better and allow you to play on higher graphics settings. Size also makes a difference. A model with a large heatsink can occupy up to three expansion slots on a motherboard. Be sure you have enough room in your PC case. When comparing GPUs with different architectures, more processing cores and even higher TFLOPS will not always translate to better performance. To help you decide which GPU you need, we have measured frame rates in a number of popular games. For more on how the Radeon R9 280 stacks up against Radeon R9 280X, check out specs charts below.

Main Specs

  Radeon R9 280 Radeon R9 280X
Power consumption (TDP) 200 Watt 250 Watt
Interface PCIe 3.0 x16 PCIe 3.0 x16
Supplementary power connectors 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin
Memory type GDDR5 GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount 3 GB 3 GB
Display Connectors 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPort
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  • Radeon R9 280X has 25% more power consumption, than Radeon R9 280.
  • Both video cards are using PCIe 3.0 x16 interface connection to a motherboard.
  • Radeon R9 280 and Radeon R9 280X have maximum RAM of 3 GB.
  • Both cards are used in Desktops.
  • Radeon R9 280 is build with GCN 1.0 architecture, and Radeon R9 280X - with GCN.
  • Radeon R9 280 and Radeon R9 280X are manufactured by 28 nm process technology.
  • Both graphics cards are the same length of 275 mm.

Game benchmarks

high / 1080p 35−40 35−40
ultra / 1080p 21−24 21−24
QHD / 1440p 16−18 16−18
4K / 2160p 10−11 10−11
low / 720p 60−65 60−65
medium / 1080p 40−45 40−45
Radeon R9 280 and Radeon R9 280X have the same average FPS in Assassin's Creed Odyssey.

Full Specs

  Radeon R9 280 Radeon R9 280X
Architecture GCN 1.0 GCN
Code name Tahiti Thaiti XTL
Type Desktop Desktop
Release date 4 March 2014 8 October 2013
Pipelines 1792 2048
Boost Clock 933 MHz 1000 MHz
Transistor count 4,313 million 4,313 million
Manufacturing process technology 28 nm 28 nm
Texture fill rate 104.5 128.0
Floating-point performance 3,344 gflops 4,096 gflops
Length 275 mm 275 mm
Memory bus width 384 Bit 384 Bit
Memory clock speed 1250 MHz
Memory bandwidth 240 GB/s 288 GB/s
Shared memory -
Shader Model 5.1 5.1
OpenGL 4.6 4.6
OpenCL 1.2 1.2
Vulkan + +
Monero / XMR (CryptoNight) 0.5 kh/s
FreeSync + +
Bus support PCIe 3.0 PCIe 3.0
HDMI + +
Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) 408 Mh/s 494 Mh/s
Eyefinity + +
HD3D + +
TrueAudio + +
Design reference reference
DisplayPort support +
CrossFire + +
DDMA audio + +
Decred / DCR (Decred) 1.07 Gh/s
Ethereum / ETH (DaggerHashimoto) 21.5 Mh/s 14.42 Mh/s
Zcash / ZEC (Equihash) 285 Sol/s
AppAcceleration +
LiquidVR + +
TressFX + +
UVD + +
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