AMD's decision to start off with mid-range RDNA 4 GPUs now seems prescient. NVIDIA's high-end RTX 5090 and 5080 are already selling well beyond their absurdly high prices, if you can find any in stock at all. And while the RTX 5070 Ti impressed us, it's already selling for close to the 5080's 1,000 launch price. Now AMD's Radeon 9070 and 9070 XT, which are set to arrive on March 6, have the chance to swoop in and deliver some serious competition. Based on early briefings from AMD, which include some impressive benchmarks (still untested by us), the RDNA 4 GPUs appear to be compelling 4K and 1,440p for discerning gamers who aren't ready to drop four figures on a video card.

The long wait is over. After kinda-sorta-teasing the Radeon RX 9070 and 9070 XT at CES 2025, AMD is finally pulling back the curtain on its next-generation graphics cards today, ahead of a March 6 launch date. AMD shuffled Radeon's branding this generation to mirror Nvidia's; the Radeon 599 RX 9070 XT will thus compete with the 749 RTX 5070 Ti, while the Radeon 549 RX 9070 takes aim at the 549 RTX 5070. Let's start with an overview of the improvements found in AMD's new RDNA 4 graphics architecture, before moving onto details about the Radeon RX 9070 series specifically, and what's coming with FSR 4 and Hypr-RX. One thing revealed in AMD's CES teaser: The Radeon 9000-series is built from the ground up for an AI future.

There was no question that NVIDIA's RTX 5000 GPUs would be one of the biggest stories at CES 2025, and I figured Intel and AMD to arrive with some new hardware of their own. But I didn't expect that each of these companies would, in their own way, be putting the pedal to the metal when it comes to power for their chip designs. After all, we've spent the last few years covering AI PC CPUs that was targeting efficiency more than raw performance. While NVIDIA RTX 5000 GPUs seem to deliver the performance leap we expected over its 2022-era cards, AMD is also redefining what's possible for mobile workstations with its Ryzen AI Max chips, which combine powerful graphics with gobs of integrated memory. Intel isn't sitting still either -- it's finally moving Arrow Lake into the high-performance and gaming arena with its Core Ultra 200HX chips, which can reach up to 24 cores and 5.5GHz speeds.

CES 2025 was packed with all kinds of techie announcements, but for me the highlight was all the new graphics cards. Nvidia and AMD both played their hands with next-generation products, with some caveats. Nvidia certainly stole the show, with the GeForce RTX 50 Series announcement serving as the key opening message in CEO Jensen Huang's keynote speech. AMD was much softer in its talk, with sparse details on its new RDNA 4 graphics cards, resulting in similarly sparse enthusiasm. Let's go over what we learned from both companies about their GPUs and where your attention should be in 2025.

The rumors were true! AMD unveiled the Radeon RX 9070 and 9070 XT during the company's CES 2025 keynote on Monday, powered by the next-generation RDNA 4 architecture with a new AI-focused version of FSR (FidelityFX Super Resolution) in tow. Gamers hoping for deep details were left wanting, however, as AMD classified this as a "preview" without much hard information. It was more of a tease than anything, honestly, though it's clear that AMD is finally, truly embracing AI hardware within GPUs. Here's what we do know. For years, AMD has battled Nvidia's vaunted DLSS using (mostly) graphics cores rather than integrating dedicated AI hardware. AMD says RDNA 4 was built from the ground up on TSMC's 4nm process to "supercharge" AI performance, driven by a massive overhaul to the AI compute architecture.

The holiday season has barely begun, but some of us are already getting ready for CES 2025. Shortly after New Year's Day, many from the Engadget team will be packing our bags to fly to Las Vegas, where we'll be covering tech's biggest annual conference. As usual, our inboxes are already flooded with pitches from companies that are planning to be there, and our calendars are filling up with appointments for briefings and demos. Based on our experience, as well as observation of recent industry trends, it's fairly easy to make educated predictions about what we might see in January. Over the years, the focus of the conference has spanned areas like TVs, cars, smart home products and personal health, with a smattering of laptops and accessories thrown in.

The holiday season has barely begun, but some of us are already getting ready for CES 2025. Shortly after New Year's Day, many from the Engadget team will be packing our bags to fly to Las Vegas, where we'll be covering tech's biggest annual conference. As usual, our inboxes are already flooded with pitches from companies that are planning to be there, and our calendars are filling up with appointments for briefings and demos. Based on our experience, as well as observation of recent industry trends, it's fairly easy to make educated predictions about what we might see in January. Over the years, the focus of the conference has spanned areas like TVs, cars, smart home products and personal health, with a smattering of laptops and accessories thrown in.