Is the Intel Arc A380 worth buying this Holiday Season?

Intel launched the Arc A380 as their first consumer GPU earlier this year. This graphics card is targeted towards a budget entry-level market and mainly competes against the GTX 1650 and the RX 6500 XT.

It is a fresh option, a departure from the general green and red camp offerings. Thus, it is no surprise that users are inclined towards Intel after trying out multiple graphics cards from either of the two industry leaders in the past.

Being a budget $140 option, many gamers are considering this graphics card for their low-cost gaming rig as well. However, there are a few more points to consider before finalizing this card for gaming purposes.

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The Arc A380 has got the price right but the performance wrong

The Gunnir variant of the graphics card (Image via Newegg)

The Intel A380 is a budget graphics card. It is based on the DG2-128 graphics processor, which packs 1,024 shading units, 64 Texture Mapping Units (TMUs), 32 Render Output Units (ROPs), 128 Execution Units, and 8 ray tracing (RT) cores.

The graphics card comes with 6 GB of GDDR6 video memory that is based on a narrow 96-bit. Thus, its bandwidth is much lower than a typical card with such video memory, coming in at just 186 GB/s.

Thus, it is no surprise that the Arc A380 cannot perform well in modern AAA video games. It cannot run most titles at 1080p resolutions with a decent framerate.

According to TechPowerUp's GPU computing power aggregate, the Arc A380 is slower than the basic Radeon RX 6400. AMD's graphics card costs are similar to Intel's offering.

The Intel Arc A380 is slower than the GTX 1650 as well, which in itself is the bare minimum listed by most games these days. It shows that Team Blue's GPU is not built for gaming purposes.

However, gamers can derive more performance from the chip by overclocking the Intel graphics card. As shown by YouTuber Testing Games, applying a slight OC can push the graphics card to beat the GTX 1650. It even gets very close to the RX 6400.

Thus, for the majority of gamers, avoiding this graphics card is the best option. Gamers should buy at least a Radeon RX 6500 XT for gaming in 2022. Some variants of the RTX 3050 competitor have dropped down to as low as $149.99. Thus, one will have to spend just $10 more for a card that is much faster than the A380.

It is worth noting that Intel GPUs are riddled with multiple issues. Their drivers are nowhere as polished as Intel or AMD. In addition, Alchemist graphics cards falter in older DirectX 9-based games. Thus, performance varies widely depending on the title the graphics card is being tested in.

The Arc A380 is a first-generation product. These issues are not an anomaly. They are expected to rise.

Thus, gamers who want to plug the card into their system and forget about it should avoid this card completely. The RX 6400 is a much safer bet if the budget cannot be extended.