AMD Big Navi leak makes Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti look way better

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AMD Big Navi might not be the Nvidia killer some are expecting. According to a new leak, AMD's upcoming graphics card may only be a modest step up, and could fall short of what's expected to be a very powerful Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti.

This leak comes from Coreteks (via TechRadar), citing sources in Asia. Big Navi's performance will reportedly be more in line with the Nvidia RTX 2080 Ti, Nvidia's most powerful current-gen GPU. AMD has allegedly told partners that Big Navi will deliver 15% percent better performance compared to the RTX 2080 Ti at best, and that's for titles that are optimized for AMD graphics cards.

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That would place Big Navi in direct competition with the standard Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080, and not the higher-end RTX 3080 Ti like many were expecting. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's a bit underwhelming considering that previous leaks have tipped Big Navi as being up to 50 perfect faster than the current 2080 Ti.

The Coreteks report also suggests that there may be two Big Navi models available at launch, similar to the AMD Radeon RX 5700XT and RX 5700 that released last year. AMD is also expected to have a "Navy Flounder" in the works for early 2021, which is suggested to be a mid-range model that could take on Nvidia's successor the RTX 2060.

AMD Big Navi is currently tipped for a September reveal, with a possible launch to follow on October 7. That's around the same time Nvidia is expected to take the wraps off of the GeForce RTX 3080 and 3080 Ti, the former of which could be up to 21% more powerful than Nvidia's professional grade RTX Titan card according to leaked benchmarks.

AMD is reportedly looking to undercut Nvidia on price for the next generation of graphics cards, which could give Big Navi an edge despite not having true Nvidia-killing performance. We're only weeks away from what should be the launch of these two major GPUs, so expect more leaks and rumors to surface until then.

Mike Andronico is Senior Writer at CNNUnderscored. He was formerly Managing Editor at Tom's Guide, where he wrote extensively on gaming, as well as running the show on the news front. When not at work, you can usually catch him playing Street Fighter, devouring Twitch streams and trying to convince people that Hawkeye is the best Avenger.