RTX 4070 VRAM – is 12GB enough in 2023?

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Now confirmed, the RTX 4070 VRAM is under scrutiny, particularly whether it’s even enough for modern gaming needs.

The RTX 4070 specs are now confirmed. Before, we had multiple different rumours and tiny bits of information pieced together to compile these specs – and one thing they all agreed on was the VRAM. Now confirmed to include 12GB GDDR6 VRAM, the RTX 4070 will feature the same amount of memory as the 4070 Ti, which also features the same AD104 chip powering the upcoming release.

The RTX 4070’s biggest competitor is the RX 7900 XT. AMD Radeon’s RDNA 3 graphics card launched late in 2022, and offered a fantastic balance of affordability for performance. Nvidia, on the other-hand, have been under scrutiny from consumers for their prices. While the 4070 is the cheapest 40-series graphics card yet – it’s going to need to offer a practical amount of power to be worth it.

It’s gone as far as AMD poking fun at Nvidia, and suggesting that “more memory matters” right before the suspected launch of the RTX 4070. If VRAM isn’t something that doesn’t really concern you too much and the 4070 is the GPU for you, here’s where you can buy it:

Amazon US

Best Buy

Newegg

Is the 12GB VRAM going to be enough for the modern standards of gaming in 2023.

Is the RTX 4070’s 12GB VRAM enough?

In 2021, AMD launched their RDNA 2 Navi 21 GPUs. With the RX 6800 featuring 16GB and the RX 6700 featuring 12GB VRAM, is the 12GB VRAM enough for the RTX 4070?

Realistically, if we’re going to be comparing graphics cards across different architectures, such as RDNA and RTX, we’re not going to be able to do a spec by spec comparison. 12GB of RTX VRAM might behave slightly differently to 12GB of RDNA VRAM – partly due to the differences in cores. For example, the RTX cards are renowned for their ray tracing superiority, and has a better optimised systerm. This certainly does make a difference, and could definitely impact how the RTX 4070’s alleged VRAM performs.

Our personally recommendation is that 12GB VRAM is more than enough for gaming at 1080p and 1440p, but you could honestly struggle to maintain consistent frame-rates at 4K. We’ve had a look at if 8GB VRAM is good enough for gaming and came to a similar conclusion.

And, now that the reviews have been published, it’s becoming clear that the GPU is not suited for 4K gaming.

At the end of the day – we lean on the side of AMD, who are offering more VRAM for much less. We’re going to be keeping an eye out for the latest updates, especially on confirmation of the RTX 4070’s VRAM. Make sure to check back in with us periodically for the latest.

Frequently Asked Questions

Will the RTX 4070 be good for 1440p gaming?

The RTX 4070 will likely be suited for 1440p gaming, as the 12GB VRAM is more than enough for QHD.

Is the RTX 4070 VRAM enough for 4K gaming?

For the RTX 4070 VRAM, we think it will be able to game in 4K, though it’s likely to struggle at times.

About the Author

Amaar Chowdhury

Amaar is a gaming journalist with an interest in covering the industry's corporations. Aside from that, he has a hankering interest in retro games that few people care about anymore.