Radeon HD 7970M vs Radeon RX 480 mobile

If you are going to buy a new graphics card and are choosing between Radeon HD 7970M and Radeon RX 480 mobile, 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 HD 7970M stacks up against Radeon RX 480 mobile, check out specs charts below.

Radeon HD 7970M and Radeon RX 480 mobile are Laptop Graphics Cards

Note: Radeon HD 7970M and Radeon RX 480 mobile are only used in laptop graphics. They have lower GPU clock speed compared to the desktop variant, which results in lower power consumption, but also 10-30% lower gaming performance. Check available laptop models with Radeon HD 7970M or Radeon RX 480 mobile here:

Main Specs

  Radeon HD 7970M Radeon RX 480 mobile
Power consumption (TDP) 100 Watt 100 Watt
Interface MXM-B (3.0) MXM-B (3.0)
Supplementary power connectors None
Memory type GDDR5 GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount 2 GB 8 GB
Display Connectors No outputs No outputs
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  • Both graphics cards have the same power consumption of 100 Watt.
  • Both video cards are using MXM-B (3.0) interface connection to a motherboard.
  • Radeon RX 480 mobile has 6 GB more memory, than Radeon HD 7970M.
  • Both cards are used in Laptops.
  • Radeon HD 7970M is build with GCN architecture, and Radeon RX 480 mobile - with Polaris.
  • Radeon HD 7970M is manufactured by 28 nm process technology, and Radeon RX 480 mobile - by 14 nm process technology.
  • Memory clock speed of Radeon RX 480 mobile is 3200 MHz higher, than Radeon HD 7970M.

Game benchmarks

high / 1080p 18−20 12−14
ultra / 1080p 10−12 7−8
QHD / 1440p 5−6 0−1
4K / 2160p 4−5
low / 720p 35−40 27−30
medium / 1080p 21−24 14−16
The average gaming FPS of Radeon HD 7970M in Assassin's Creed Odyssey is 37% more, than Radeon RX 480 mobile.

Full Specs

  Radeon HD 7970M Radeon RX 480 mobile
Architecture GCN Polaris
Code name Wimbledon XT Polaris
Type Laptop Laptop
Release date 1 May 2012 1 August 2016
Pipelines 1280 2304
Core clock speed 850 MHz
Boost Clock 1077 MHz
Transistor count 2,800 million 5,700 million
Manufacturing process technology 28 nm 14 nm
Texture fill rate 68.00 155.1
Floating-point performance 2,176 gflops 4,963 gflops
Memory bus width 256 Bit 256 Bit
Memory clock speed 4800 MHz 8000 MHz
Memory bandwidth 153.6 GB/s 256.0 GB/s
Shared memory - -
DirectX 12 (11_1) 12 (12_0)
Shader Model 5.1 6.4
OpenGL 4.6 4.6
OpenCL 1.2 2.0
Vulkan 1.2.131 1.2.131
Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) 254 Mh/s
Laptop size large large
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