The Best graphics cards for video editing in 2024
Editing videos can be a grind—an especially slow and loud one when your graphics card isn’t up to the task.
Building a video editing PC can help you handle most demanding tasks, but if you want to add complex transitions and effects, work with motion graphics, render 4K and 8K videos fast, and multi-task with zero interruptions, you’ll need a dedicated graphics card (GPU—which stands for graphics processing unit, but nobody calls it that).
With hundreds of GPUs to choose from, how do you pick the right one for your needs and budget?
Top 12 best graphics cards (GPUs) for video editing
1. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090
Best overall video editing graphics card
NVIDIA has prioritized content creation with its latest GeForce releases. The GeForce RTX 3090 is part of the RTX 30 series of NVIDIA graphics cards—which includes the RTX 3080 below—fitted with many efficiency and performance advancements.
The large triple-slot card has 24 GB onboard video memory (VRAM) to deliver high-quality performance and render videos faster. It supports NVLink, a high-speed CPU and GPU connection, which lets processors send and receive data at lightning speed. This makes the card more suitable for editing videos with detailed geometry and large scenes.
The RTX 3090 card significantly outperforms the RTX 2000 series GPUs in different render engines, but performs almost on par with the RTX 2080 Ti cards in Adobe Creative Cloud and DaVinci Resolve. It also supports real-time ray tracing for creating videos with realistic lightning effects.
Overall, the RTX 3090 is a great improvement over previous generations, with better handling of demanding video editing workloads in any application.
Features:
Pros:
- Faster rendering
- Keeps up with strenuous demands
- Excellent cooling
- Adequate onboard memory
- Delivers high-quality performance
- Supports NVLink
Cons:
- Expensive
- May not fit some PC cases
2. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080
Best value for money
Editing videos with NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card is extraordinary when you see everything it can do.
It’s more affordable than the RTX 3090 with better rendering performance. But its onboard memory is lower than the RTX 3090, meaning it’ll limit the complexity of scenes you can render.
The average video editor probably won't spot much of a difference with the GeForce RTX 30 series cards. But if you use a lot of GPU-accelerated effects, these cards deliver better performance and video quality than older models of the same price.
The Founders Edition doesn’t have USB-C output, which is a must if you’re a professional content creator using USB-C monitors. But it makes up for that with three DisplayPort outputs and an HDMI 2.1 output.
Whether you’re editing 8K video or rendering complex 3D models, the RTX 3080 balances performance and value, helping you produce your best videos.
Features:
Pros:
- Fast performance
- Dual axial flow cooling
- Good rendering
- Decent memory
- Value for money
Cons:
- Pricey
- No USB-C in Founders Edition
3. AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT
Best for ultra-high frame rates
While most GPU releases focus on gaming, AMD has included a content creation performance section on its product pages. The section is based on benchmarks from reliable review sites and can help you compare GPUs.
Like other AMD Radeon RX graphics cards, the RX 6900 XT is engineered with powerful compute units, hardware ray tracing acceleration, and other features for ultra-high frame rates.
That said, AMD’s RX 6000 cards are more constrained by memory. The RX 6900 XT is no different. Its large 16 GB VRAM uses GDDR6 memory, which may be useful for some video editing workloads but pales in comparison to NVIDIA’s GDDR6X memory.
Ultimately, you’ll need to decide whether picking the lower-priced RX 6900 over a more powerful card like the RTX 3090 is worth the large performance loss.
Features:
Pros:
- AMD RDNA 2 architecture
- Ideal for professional content creation
- Significantly faster than previous gen AMD GPUs
Cons:
- Expensive
- Struggles in GPU-intensive apps compared to other GPUs
4. AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT
Best budget graphics card
Like the RX 6900 XT, the RX 6800 XT video card is based on the RDNA 2 graphics architecture and comes with boosted efficiency, making it significantly faster than previous generation AMD GPUs. It also costs less than the 6900 XT, which is incrementally faster.
While it doesn’t beat NVIDIA’s RTX 30-series cards, the speedy Infinity Cache in the 6800 XT narrows the gap it would experience when pitted against NVIDIA cards. Plus, it can boost up to 2250 MHz, making it useful in 4K video editing and super busy workloads.
Other notable features include the DirectX 12 Ultimate-compatible Ray Accelerators on each of the 6800 XT’s compute units, which allow the card to handle real-time ray tracing with a steady frame rate.
Features:
Pros:
- Effective cooler
- Strong performance
- Cheaper than rival GPUs
- Higher clock speeds
- Offers USB-C video out
Cons:
- Dated card design
- Lacks Tensor cores
- Lags behind NVIDIA cards for 4K with ray tracing activated
5. NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti
Best mid-range video editing GPU
Although the “Ti” in the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti stands for “titanium,” NVIDIA didn’t use the metal to manufacture its card. It just means it’s a more powerful GPU than non-Ti GPU versions with faster memory and/or more CUDA cores.
To stay competitive against rival AMD GPUs, NVIDIA releases Ti versions of its GPUs, such as the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti as a response to AMD’s Vega 56 and RX 590.
If you want high frame rates, amazing detail levels at high resolutions, and software support at an affordable price, try the GTX 1660 Ti. It’s a plug-and-play straight swap card built on the Turing architecture, which debuted the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti.
This mid-range GPU, which replaced the older GTX 1060, is loaded with architectural enhancements for faster performance, better efficiency, and a superior video editing experience.
Features:
Pros:
- Supports up to 4 monitors
- Great performance at 1920 x 1080
- Efficient and overclockable
- Effective dual-BIOS profiles optimized for noise
- Compact and more affordable
Cons:
- No hardware ray tracing
- No Tensor cores
- Memory is limited to 12 Gbps speeds
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