This article provides an overview of the top five (5) AMD and NVIDIA graphics cards for Elden Ring. Graphics cards are in high demand and so is Elden Ring. According to USA Today, Elden Ring is the most hyped and is setup to be one of the most successful games of the year and has sold over 13 million copies. However, there is a big bottleneck for gamers who want to play the game.
The minimum system requirement for a graphics card is the NVIDIA GeForce 1060 3GB, or AMD Radeon RX 580 4GB. These are lower end graphics cards but only about half (~55%) are able to meet the minimum requirement, according to Steam’s April 2022 Hardware Survey. And even less (~45-48%) are able to meet the recommended Graphics card requirement, which are the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 8 GB or AMD Radeon RX VEGA 56 8 GB. That means there are a lot of gamers out there who might want to play Elden Ring, but either can’t play at minimum settings or recommended settings.
Selecting a Graphics Card Can Be Challenging
Those gamers who do want to play Elden Ring but don’t have graphics cards to meet the requirement will have to upgrade. The challenge with upgrading graphics cards is that without doing some pretty heavy research it can be hard to understand which graphics card will handle Elden Ring, given how many different kinds are on the market. Many just rely on price and the latest graphics cards on the market, but savvy graphics cards enthusiasts know how to select a good one and can often find a good graphics card that fits well within a certain budget amount.
Another challenge with the graphics card market right now is the unbelievable high prices and scarcity of them. According to PCWorld and many others, the prices of graphics cards are so high because of high demand from gamers and crypto miners as well as the supply chain havoc resulting from COVID-19. Many of the graphics cards on the market simply are not available or are priced too high to be considered.
The cards that are reviewed here all exceed the recommended system requirements and hopefully most of them will not break the bank.
Don’t Buy the AMD Radeon RX VEGA 56 8GB
This is the graphics card listed in the recommended system requirements. However, when you look at the pricing (anywhere from $800-$1,600), it becomes clear that it is overpriced since its MSRP is only $399. The Radeon RX Vega 56 8GB graphics card is good and will perform at the recommended system requirement, but there are better cards out there for cheaper. The reason the Vega 56 is so expensive is because it is no longer being manufactured and there are less of them. This card should not be seriously considered as a purchase option, since there are newer cards on the market that perform better for a lesser price point.
Don’t Buy the NVIDIA 1070 8GB
Again, this is one of the graphics cards listed as a recommended system requirement and again prices are well above MSRP. The MSRP on the NVIDIA 1070 8GB graphics card is $375 and these are currently being listed at over $600 new on many online outlet stores. The reason for this is that the NVIDIA 1070 8GB GPUs are not being manufactured anymore and there is less of them, driving the price up. This card is not a recommended purchasing option.
Graphics Card (GPU) Prices Are Dropping
As a matter of fact, graphics card prices are dropping back to normal levels. According to a recent TechRadar article, there are a number of competitive pressures that will drive the price of new graphics cards down, including more availability, and competition from Intel’s Arc graphics card. That would mean that buying anything except brand new graphics cards at or slightly below MSRP would not make sense. If this is true, it will be a beacon of hope for gamers who have been holding off on upgrading.
And for that reason, the list of Top 10 Graphics Cards below is focused only on the new AMD and NVIDIA models. A list of OEM Retailers is provided along with each brand of graphics cards that leads directly to their Amazon site from which you can compare prices (this blog does earn a small commission if you purchase anything, and it goes towards funding posts like this).
Top 5 NVIDIA Graphics Cards for Elden Ring
| Model | Clock Speed | CUDA Cores | Memory |
| GeForce RTX 3090 Ti | 1.67 GHz | 10752 | 24GB GDDR6X |
| GeForce RTX 3090 | 1.4 GHz | 10,496 | 24GB GDDR6X |
| GeForce RTX 3080 Ti | 1.37 GHz | 10,240 | 12GB GDDR6X |
| GeForce RTX 3080 | 1.44 GHz | 8,704 | 10GB GDDR6X |
| GeForce RTX 3070 Ti | 1.58 GHz | 6,144 | 8GB GDDR6X |
List of NVIDIA OEM Retail Sites on Amazon
- ZOTAC NVIDIA Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
- EVGA NVIDIA Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
- GIGABYTE NVIDIA Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
- MSI NVIDIA Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
Top 5 AMD Graphics Cards for Elden Ring
| Model | Clock Speed | Compute Units | Memory |
| Radeon RX 6950 XT | 2100 MHz | 80 | 16GB GDDR6 |
| Radeon RX 6900 XT | 2.15 GHz | 80 | 16GB GDDR6 |
| Radeon RX 6800 XT | 2.15 GHz | 72 | 16GB GDDR6 |
| Radeon RX 6800 | 1.85 GHz | 60 | 16GB GDDR6 |
| Radeon RX 6750 XT | 2.49 GHz | 40 | 12GB GDDR6 |
List of AMD Radeon OEM Retail Sites on Amazon
- PowerColor RedDevil Radeon Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
- Sapphire (Nitro+) Radeon Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
- XFX Radeon Graphics Cards (Amazon.com)
Conclusion
Elden Ring is one of the most performance-demanding games on the shelf. There are a lot of older graphics cards that can handle it but would not be a great purchasing decision for an upgrade due to their high cost from limited availability. Gamers are better off buying brand new due to the cost and performance and technology gained.