Is Ray Tracing Worth It? Here’s When to Turn It On & Skip It
Is ray tracing worth it? It can be worth it if you have a powerful graphics card, such as an RTX 40 or 50-series GPU. With Ray tracing, lighting, shadows, and reflections look more realistic, but it also uses a lot of GPU power. If your graphics card is not powerful enough, turning on ray tracing can reduce your FPS too much. So, remember that it works best at 1440p or 4K when you also use upscaling.
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Is Ray Tracing Worth It?- Quick Answer
Quick Answer
| Your Setup | Verdict | Why |
|---|---|---|
| High-end RTX 40/50-series or RDNA 4, 1440p/4K | WORTH IT | Enough headroom to run RT plus upscaling without gutting your FPS. |
| Mid-range RTX 5060/5070-tier, 1080p/1440p | SITUATIONAL | Works in some games with upscaling on, drops too hard in others. Test per-game. |
| Entry-level RTX, older AMD cards, or competitive shooters | SKIP IT | The FPS cost isn’t worth it, and you likely value smoothness over lighting anyway. |
What Ray Tracing Actually Does
Ray tracing is a lighting technique that calculates how light really behaves, tracing individual rays as they bounce, reflect, and scatter off surfaces instead of faking those effects the way traditional rendering (rasterization) does. That’s why ray-traced reflections in puddles, glass, and chrome look convincingly real instead of like a flat, pre-baked texture. Shadows and global illumination (how light spreads and bounces around a whole scene) get the same treatment.
The trade-off is cost. Simulating real light bounces per pixel is far more demanding than rasterization’s shortcuts, which is exactly why ray tracing needs dedicated hardware (RT cores on NVIDIA and AMD’s ray accelerators) and still hits your framerate hard even with that hardware helping.
Ray Tracing FPS Drop: How Much Are We Actually Talking?
This is the number that decides everything about is ray tracing worth it? Enabling full ray tracing (not just one effect like shadows, but reflections plus global illumination together) commonly cuts framerates by 30 to 50% compared to the same settings with RT off, and full path tracing modes like the one in Cyberpunk 2077’s Overdrive preset can be even steeper. That’s a bigger performance impact than almost any other single setting in a game’s graphics menu.
This is exactly why DLSS and FSR upscaling exist alongside ray tracing rather than as a separate feature. Tom’s Hardware’s own testing on ray tracing performance consistently frames RT and upscaling as a package deal on modern GPUs, since upscaling is what claws back the framerate that ray tracing takes away. If your card doesn’t have a strong upscaler available, or the game you’re playing doesn’t support one well, the RT performance impact hits you with nothing to offset it.
Card brand matters here too. AMD’s GPUs have historically been the weaker side of this equation, a gap Tom’s Hardware’s own RX 9070 XT review confirmed still exists even in AMD’s newer RDNA 4 cards, though the difference has narrowed generation over generation. If you’re weighing this directly, our RX 9070 XT vs RTX 5080 comparison and RTX 5080 vs RTX 5090 comparison both break down where each card lands on raw horsepower before you even factor in ray tracing specifically.
Does Resolution Change the Answer?
Yes, significantly, and this is where the “worth it” debate actually gets decided in most households.
- 1080p — you likely already have GPU headroom to spare at this resolution, but ray tracing is also the least visually noticeable here since screen real estate is smaller. Most competitive and high-refresh players skip it entirely and chase raw frames instead.
- 1440p — the resolution where the decision is most genuinely case-by-case. A strong mid-range or higher GPU with upscaling enabled can usually hold a playable framerate with RT on, but it varies heavily by game.
- 4K — ray tracing looks its best here (more pixels means more visible detail in reflections and lighting), but it’s also the most demanding combination possible. You need a genuinely high-end card, and you’ll almost certainly need upscaling running alongside it.
For a deeper look at how much of a difference resolution alone makes to your framerate, independent of ray tracing, see our 1080p vs 1440p for gaming breakdown. If you’re not sure which side of the ray tracing decision your setup falls on, run your specific CPU and GPU through our PC Bottleneck Calculator at your actual resolution before you decide. It’s also worth checking which part of your system is already maxed out using our GPU vs CPU bottleneck guide.
If your GPU is already the limiting factor in your games, ray tracing will only make that gap worse, not better. If that guide points you toward a GPU upgrade instead, our Best CPU for RTX 5080 guide covers what to pair it with so the new card isn’t held back on the CPU side.
Should You Turn On Ray Tracing? A Simple Test
Rather than guessing whether is Ray tracing worth it or not, use this order of operations in any game that supports it:
- Enable ray tracing at its lowest or “medium” preset first, not maximum. Many games’ highest RT preset is a small visual gain for a large performance cost.
- Turn on your GPU’s upscaler (DLSS, FSR, or XeSS depending on your card) at Quality mode alongside it.
- Check your framerate. If it’s still comfortably above your monitor’s refresh ceiling or your personal minimum, keep it on. If you’re dropping below what feels smooth, that’s your answer.
If you want to watch the actual usage numbers while you test this instead of just judging by feel, our HWiNFO64 guide, GPU-Z guide, and MSI Afterburner overlay guide walk through setting up a live FPS and GPU usage display so you can see the exact cost in real time as you toggle settings.
What Real Players Decided
Is ray tracing worth it on a lower-end RTX card?
This exact question came up on the Tom’s Hardware Forum from someone choosing between an RTX 2060 Super and a non-RT AMD card. The community’s consensus was blunt: enabling RT on an entry-level RTX card roughly halves your framerate, and if you genuinely care about ray tracing, it’s better to save up for a higher tier card than settle for weak RT performance on a budget one.
Is ray tracing worth it in Cyberpunk?
On a high-end RTX 40 or 50-series card, yes, especially with DLSS turned on to recover the framerate. Night City is built around neon reflections and glowing signage bouncing off wet streets, so the standard RT preset (reflections, shadows, and lighting) is one of the more visible implementations you’ll find in any game.
The full Overdrive path tracing mode is a different story: it’s the most demanding setting Cyberpunk 2077 offers, and it’s really only playable on a top-tier card running DLSS at Performance or Balanced mode with Frame Generation enabled. On a mid-range or older card, stick to the standard RT preset or skip it, since Overdrive will bring even a strong 1440p setup to its knees.
Is ray tracing worth it in Hogwarts Legacy?
This is one of the harder calls to make in either direction. Hogwarts Legacy’s ray-traced shadows and reflections are demanding enough to cut framerates by roughly 40% even on flagship hardware, and the game was notoriously poorly optimized at launch, a reputation it’s still shaking off. The upside is that the castle interiors and Great Hall are exactly the kind of static, detail-heavy scenes where ray tracing earns its keep, since you’re often walking rather than fighting.
If you’re on a high-end card with DLSS or FSR running at Quality mode, it’s worth trying at the “medium” RT preset first rather than jumping straight to the highest setting. On anything below a high-end GPU, the frame-rate hit isn’t worth it, particularly during outdoor open-world exploration where performance already dips the most.
Does ray tracing matter more in some game genres than others?
Yes, according to a recurring theme across several Steam Community threads on action and open-world titles. Players consistently pointed out that fast-paced action games don’t showcase ray tracing effects as well since you’re rarely standing still to admire reflections, while slower, atmospheric or open-world games get far more visible benefit from it.
Is ray tracing implementation quality the same in every game?
No, and this came up directly in a Steam Community discussion on Elden Ring’s ray tracing patch. Several players felt the implementation didn’t noticeably improve visual quality despite the performance cost, while pointing to other titles as examples of ray tracing done well. The lesson: “is ray tracing worth it” can have a different answer per game, not just per GPU.
The Bottom Line
Ray tracing isn’t a setting you should just leave on because it’s there, and it isn’t one you should dismiss outright either. If you’re running a high-end RTX 40 or 50-series card (or an RDNA 4 equivalent) at 1440p or 4K with upscaling turned on, you have enough headroom to enjoy it without sacrificing smoothness. Below that tier, the frame-rate cost usually outweighs the visual gain, and your time is better spent chasing higher FPS instead.
The real answer depends on your specific hardware, so don’t guess. Run your CPU and GPU through our PC Bottleneck Calculator to see exactly where your setup stands, then use the simple test above (RT medium, upscaling on, check your framerate) in the actual games you play. That’s a more reliable answer than any general rule, including this one.
For the full breakdown of how ray tracing and upscaling load your GPU differently than your CPU, see our CPU vs GPU guide. If turning on ray tracing tanks your FPS more than expected, our FPS troubleshooting guide covers free fixes to try first, our Why Is My Game Lagging guide covers the network side of the equation, and our thermal throttling guide covers what to check if performance drops the longer you play.
