5 best graphics cards for playing Portal with RTX

Portal with RTX is one of the finest demos of hardware-accelerated ray tracing on Nvidia GPUs. It is built with the help of RTX Remix, a new app from the company that can significantly improve the visuals of an old game with ray-traced illumination, shadows, and ambient occlusion.

The title was released as a free upgrade to anyone who owns the original Portal. However, only users with a high-end Nvidia RTX video card can play it at respectable framerates without dipping the resolution below 720p.

AMD cards get butchered in the title due to the lack of appropriate technology to run what is employed by Portal with RTX. Thus, users will have to confine themselves to Nvidia GPUs. The best options for the GPU are listed in this article.

Note: This article is subjective and reflects the writer's views.

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Portal with RTX requires some high-end GPUs to run smoothly

5) Nvidia RTX 3060 TI ($409.99+)

The Gigabyte RTX 3060 Ti Gaming OC (Image via Amazon)

The Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti is a powerful card at 1080p resolution. The GPU was built for gaming at this resolution without compromise. With DLSS support, gamers can even play the ray-traced Portal at 1440p.

GPU Name	RTX 3060 Ti
Memory	8 GB GDDR6 256-bit
Base clock	1,410 MHz
Boost clock	1,665 MHz

The price of the graphics card is on a downward spiral. Gamers can now pick it up for just $409.99 on leading websites.

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4) Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti ($579+)

The RTX 3070 Ti Founder's Edition (Image via Nvidia)

The Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti launched as a mid-cycle refresh to Nvidia's 1440p gaming champion, the RTX 3070. This slightly improved card delivers about 6-7% more performance at the resolution and extends the 70-class GPUs' command over 4K gaming.

Thus, gamers can play Portal with RTX at up to 1440p resolution without major performance hiccups with this GPU. They might have to rely on DLSS to achieve high framerates. However, the upscaling in the game is so good that native resolution is barely any different from DLSS output.

GPU Name	RTX 3070 Ti
Memory	8 GB GDDR6X 256-bit
Base clock	1,575 MHz
Boost clock	1,770 MHz

The cheapest RTX 3070 Ti models start from around $579. Slightly more advanced variants from add-in card manufacturers like ASUS and MSI can cost above $650. Thus, gamers will have to spend a premium to get their hands on this card.

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3) Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti ($939+)

The RTX 3080 Ti Founders' Edition video card (Image via Nvidia)

The Geforce RTX 3080 Ti is among the fastest video cards for gaming. It is a minor stepdown from the flagship RTX 3090. Many reviewers have called the GPU a 3090 but with half the VRAM.

Thus, it's no surprise that it can easily handle Portal with RTX without major performance hiccups. With the help of DLSS, gamers can get over 100 FPS at 1440p resolution.

	RTX 3080 Ti
Starting Price	$959
Nvidia CUDA Cores	10,240
Boost Clock	1665
Standard Memory Config	12GB GDDR6X
Memory Interface Width	384-bit
Ray Tracing Cores	2nd Generation
Tensor Cores	3rd Generation
Nvidia Architecture	Ampere
Nvidia DLSS	2
Nvidia Encoder	7th Generation
Graphics Card power	350 W
Recommended PSU	750 W

The RTX 3080 Ti is a premium and expensive GPU, however. The cheapest models start from around $940 on Newegg.

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2) Nvidia RTX 4080 ($1,199)

The RTX 4080 is the second-fastest GPU from Nvidia. The company claims twice the performance of the last-gen equivalent, the 3080 Ti, with the Ada Lovelace variant.

It is among the best cards for playing Portal with RTX, since it packs the latest RT cores and Tensor cores and supports DLSS 3.0 with frame-generation technologies.

	Nvidia RTX 4080
CUDA core count	9,728
Tensor cores	304
RT cores	76
Base clock	2,205 MHz
Boost clock	2,505 MHz
VRAM	16 GB GDDR6X
VRAM bus width	256 bit
Total board power (TBP)	320 W

With the framerate-multiplier feature of the card, gamers can play Portal with RTX at up to 4K resolution. The GPU, however, will set them back by $1,199.

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1) Nvidia RTX 4090 ($1,699)

The MSI Geforce RTX 4090 Gaming Trio (Image via Newegg)

The RTX 4090 is about 20% faster than the 4080. Thus, it's no surprise that the flagship Team Green card can handle Portal with RTX without performance hiccups. Gamers can play it with all the new features at sky-high framerates.

GPU Name	AD102
CUDA Core Count	16,384
Texture Mapping Units (TMUs)	512
Render Output Units (ROPs)	176
Ray Tracing (RT) Core Count	128
Tensor Core Count	512
Video Memory Size	24 GB
Video Memory Type	GDDR6X
Video Memory Bus Width	384 bit
Base Clock Speed	2235 MHz
Boost Clock Speed	2520 MHz
Memory Clock Speed	1313 MHz
MSRP	$1,599

The card will drill a hole in players pockets, however. The card was launched with an MSRP of $1,599. The cheapest models start from $1,699, with high-end variants costing well above $2,000.

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Portal with RTX is one of the most demanding titles out there, thanks to the ray-traced lighting, illumination, and more features. The game looks impeccable. Thus, it can only be guessed how RTX Remix will impact retro gaming once it publicly rolls out.