Whether you work in video editing or 3D modelling, or are a keen gamer, the best budget graphics cards can speed up your computer without breaking the bank. Indeed, capable cards are getting more affordable than ever right now, as Intel, AMD and Nvidia battle to surpass each other for both performance and affordability.
Even if you have one of the very best laptops for graphic design, an advanced graphics card may still speed up your workflow and productivity. That said, understanding the technical specs of GPUs can be complex, and prices can vary hugely. So we've done your homework for you, and picked out the absolute best budget graphics cards on the market today. We've drawn on our expert reviewers' knowledge and experience to compile this list.
The RX 7600 is one of the cheapest graphics cards from AMD, and we found it offers a lot of punch for its price. It's generally an option for 1080p gaming, but it can have a go at 1440p too. Read more below
Nvidia cards tend to be a bit pricier than AMD offerings, but the RTX 4060 is a reasonably affordable option. It has the latest Nvidia tech, excellent performance and it's very power efficient. Read more below
Intel has focused on budget to mid-range cards, and it's provided great results. The Arc A750 offers excellent performance for the most wallet-friendly price on our list. Read more below
We're stretching the definition of budget, but this is the best value graphics card we can recommend for solid 4K gaming, and it's substantially cheaper than the next options up in Nvidia's current range. Read more below
Many of the enhancements of Nvidia's latest consumer cards focus on gaming. For video, this previous-generation option remains a solid option, and it's coming in for good discounts. Read more below
Although this is from AMD's previous generation of cards, it's still a plucky GPU for 1080p gaming, with very efficient power consumption and 8GB of GDDR6 RAM. Read more below
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The best budget graphics card overall
(Image credit: AMD)
01. AMD Radeon RX 7600
The best budget graphics card overall
Our expert review:
Specifications
Stream processors: 2,048
Base clock: 2,250MHz
Boost clock: 2,655MHz
Memory: 8GB GDDR6
Reasons to buy
+
Exceptional value
+
Quiet and compact
+
Great 1080p and good 1440p performance
Reasons to avoid
-
High power consumption
-
Ray tracing isn't brilliant
Our top pick as the best budget graphics card overall is the highly rated AMD Radeon RX 7600. It may only have 8GB of VRAM, but we found that it deploys this brilliantly, offering superb 1080p performance while also having a fair crack at 1440p. It's compact so it's perfect for smaller PCs, and it runs nice and quietly.
Our sister site TechRadar described this GPU as a major gift for gamers on a budget in its review, and we have to agree. At around the $250 mark, it's the cheapest in the current generation of cards offered by either AMD or Nvidia. It's terrific value, and great for first-time builds or lean rigs more broadly.
It's important to note that it's aimed at mainstream 1080p gamers, and it does start to run out of steam at 1440p with high settings in demanding games. It's also a little power thirsty and doesn't offer so much in the way of high-performance ray-tracing action, but at this price point, ray-tracing is unlikely to be a high priority.
As for the competition, it can give Nvidia's brilliant RTX 3060 Ti a good fight, while providing a great balance of price and performance. And you can always drop image quality a little or enable FSR to make 1440p performance more viable.
Nvidia's RTX 4060 GPU is the best budget graphics card you can get from Team Green basically by default, as it's the cheapest of the current range at under $300 / £300, but it offers more than entry-level performance. When we reviewed it, we found that it provides exceptional performance at 1080p resolutions and can have a fair go at 1440p if you're willing to make some sacrifices.
Its 8GB of GDDR6 VRAM and 3,072 CUDA cores give it a fair punch but also represent a double-edged sword. 8GB is a bare minimum in 2024. That does limit thing when you go up in resolutions, but then it's what allows Nvidia to make this such a great value card. Our sister site TechRadar described it as a "fantastic upgrade for anyone looking for best-in-class 1080p performance while leaving the door open for some solid 1440p performance (with caveats) at an acceptable price point."
However, we'd say this is for those who insist on going with Nvidia. The AMD Radeon RX 7600 at number one on our list offers the best value in terms of the performance you get for the price of the card.
Incredibly affordable and great budget performance
+
Solid ray tracing
+
Cool and quiet
Reasons to avoid
-
Super-close to the AMD RX 6600 in value
-
Power hungry
-
Need Resize BAR software
Tradition had it that AMD offered the best value cards in a market of just two players: AMD and Nvidia. However, Intel's venture into the market has shaken things up in budget GPUs, and it's offerings shouldn't be dismissed. The Arc A750 is the cheapest graphics card on our list, and, while it has its failings, it offers excellent value for a modern card with 8GB of GDDR6 VRAM and 3,584 shading cores to crunch through tasks and games.
Beyond gaming, we think this card is a solid option for content creators, especially after a driver update in late 2023 improved the performance in content creation workloads by as much as 40 per cent compared to with the 2022 launch drivers. In its tests, Puget Systems found that performance was improved across a variety of creative software, particularly DaVinci Resolve and Adobe Premiere Pro.
It excels at 1080p and ray-tracing performance is decent. However, you'll almost certainly need the Resize BAR software to get the most out of the Arc A750, as our sister site PC Gamer found. It's a little power thirsty too. But, overall, it's a fine budget GPU and one that, in the right PC, will do a solid job.
OK, so this isn't exactly a budget graphics card, but it's the cheapest graphics card we can recommend for 4K gaming. The RTX 4070 is about double the cost of the 4060 at number two on our list, and you won't be getting literally double the performance, but we found the jump to be notable at all resolutions.
As I mentioned, the key thing here is that the 4070 is a 4K-capable card, which immediately makes it more future-proof and versatile as well as objectively better. In terms of what's under the hood, the 4070 has 12GB of GDDR6X VRAM (a jump up from the 8GB offerings elsewhere on this list) and 5,888 CUDA cores.
You also get the usual Nvidia features like DLSS 3 to boost frame rates and advanced ray tracing capability, making it a great mid-range GPU package. This is at at the very top of the budget spectrum, but it may well last you longer as games become increasingly demanding.
The best last-gen budget graphics card from Nvidia
Our expert review:
Specifications
CUDA cores: 4,864
Base clock: 1,410 MHz
Boost clock: 1,670 MHz
Memory: 8GB GDDR6
Reasons to buy
+
Wonderful performance at 1080p
+
Great value for money
Reasons to avoid
-
Old-gen card lacks some of the newer features for gaming
You may be tempted to limit your search for the best budget graphics cards to the latest generations, and that does make sense for futureproofing. However, if you cast your net further back in time, you may find the RTX 3006 Ti is the perfect GPU.
It often comes in for discounts since it's been usurped by the current generation's 4060. Yet performance-wise, its 8GB of GDDR6 RAM, and 4,864 CUDA cores still offer a lean-but-still-mean spec sheet, and we find no trouble with high-quality gaming or programs at 1080p, with the card happily crunch through tasks at that resolution. While it's still available, the RTX 3060 Ti is still a viable option in budget waters.
It doesn't have the latest enhancements of Nvidia's 4000 series, but many of those features are aimed at gaming. If you're looking for a card for video editing, this should still do the job for 1080p/FHD work.
We could have picked the slightly cheaper Radeon RX 6600 card to give you the most budget graphics card from AMD, but we think the 6600 XT offers a slightly better proposition for not much more money. While it is from AMD's previous generation of cards, it's still a 1080p powerhouse and has very efficient power consumption. With 2,048 stream processors and 8GB of GDDR6 RAM, it still has the solid offerings of a plucky budget GPU.
1080p is definitely where it's happiest and fastest. It will give 1440p resolution and work a good go too, though don't expect gangbuster framerates if you're keeping the quality settings high. When it was released it was a little bit too expensive for its mid-range place (taking on Nvidia's RTX 3060), but now the prices have fallen, the value for money here has improved and the gap with the cheaper RX 6600 is smaller.
If you've already got a budget graphics card from the AMD generation before the 6600 XT, you might not see an enormous leap. But overall, this is one of the best AMD graphics cards on a budget.
When choosing computer components like graphics cards, it can be easy to get lost in all the specs, numbers and technical terms, so a good thing to do is keep in mind what you realistically need. When you're choosing a budget graphics card, it pays to be realistic – you're not going to get fantastic 4K gaming for cheap, but you may not need that.
For most applications, 1080p is just fine, perhaps with 1440p as a stretch option if you have the budget. If you're gaming, you may want to focus more on frame rate, with 60p being preferable over 30p if possible. There are basically three big three names to choose from: Nvidia, Intel or AMD. Nvidia remain the leaders when it comes to graphics cards, and they produce some of the best in the business – however, Intel and AMD can be great manufacturers to look at if you want to maximise value for money.
Remember that you also don't necessarily have to look at the latest models. Sometimes grabbing a last-gen card can be a great way to save yourself some cash while still getting the specs you need. Our pick of the best budget graphics card overall for a balance of features and price is the AMD Radeon RX 7600, which belongs to the current generation. Those who need more power than this might prefer to look at Nvidia's previous 3000 range rather than the current 4000 GPUs.
We have picked the best budget graphics cards for this guide based on a combination of our writers' hands-on review and texting experience, as well as that of our other writers and editors from our sister sites such as TechRadar and GamesRadar. When picking graphics cards we look at the base specs, but we also draw on the real-world experience of our writers and look at user reviews, to get a sense of whether a card's performance matches the manufacturer's claims.
Budget graphics cards are typically aimed at users who don't require the absolute peak performance of high-end cards but still want a decent gaming experience, or improved graphics capabilities for other tasks like video editing or 3D modeling.
As you might expect, budget graphics cards offer lower performance compared to high-end GPUs, especially in demanding games and applications. On the flipside, they typically consume less power, which typically means they're cheaper to buy, and they generate less power in use.
While budget GPUs offer a good balance of performance and affordability, they may not be suitable for everyone. If you're a serious gamer or professional content creator, investing in a higher-end graphics card might be a better choice.
Why are GPUs so expensive?
Even by the standards of computer components (and, y'know, everything else) prices of GPUs have shot up in recent years. However, unlike some other computer components, where prices have returned somewhat to normal in the aftermath of global shockwaves such as the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, GPU prices have remained stubbornly high, even while demand doesn't seem to be rising to meet them.
The short answer is that nobody knows exactly why this is, although there are theories. It could be an increase in the cost of wafers from Taiwanese foundry TSMC, though the specifics of the contracts they have with Nvidia and AMD are a closely guarded secret, so we don't know if that's a factor.
The answer could be as simple as a good old-fashioned concerted price hike – discrete graphics cards are a luxury that not many people are willing to pay for, but the manufacturers may be betting that the enthusiasts who want them will simply fork over the asking price regardless of what it is. Some have speculated that the rise of interest in generative AI may be fuelling a perceived spike in interest in GPUs, causing prices to stay at high levels. But ultimately, all this is guesswork, and it may take time for GPU prices to return to reasonable levels. If indeed they do at all.
Why is RTX more expensive than GTX?
If you're looking for the best cheap graphics card, you'll probably have noticed the Nvidia's RTX cards are cheaper than its GTX cards.
GTX stands for Giga Texel Shader eXtreme (GTX) and RTX for Ray Tracing Texel eXtreme (RTX). Both are produced under the GeForce brand, but the latter is a newer technology. The GTX series uses Pascal and Turing architecture while RTX uses more advanced Turing and Ampere architecture.
One major difference in gaming is the hardware-accelerated ray tracing in RTX cards, which provides more realism in lighting and shadow. And while they require more power, RTX GPUS are also more efficient on a per watt basis.
Are cheap GPUs good?
As with most tech products, the answer to this question is something of a case-by-case basis. As we've seen in this guide, it is absolutely possible to get a cheap graphics card that will do everything you need it to, provided you've set realistic expectations. However, there are also plenty of cheap cards that don't represent good value for money, which is why it always pays to read reviews and make sure you're not getting hoodwinked by a deal that's too good to be true.
Do I need a discrete GPU?
It depends on what you plan to do with your computer. Discrete GPUs are great for high-intensity gaming with top-end graphics and fast frame rates. They're also great for crunching through design tasks that require a lot of graphical horsepower, such as editing high-resolution videos or photos. If these doesn't sound like the sort of ways you'll be using your computer, then it's likely the built-in GPU your computer has will be sufficient for your purposes.
Deputy Editor, TechRadar Gaming; Tech, hardware and games writer
Rob is the Deputy Editor at TechRadar Gaming, and a writer on games, gaming hardware, and tech, and also gardens and landscapes. He has been in the gaming and tech media industry for more than six years with bylines at the likes of Eurogamer, PCGamer, RockPaperShotgun, GamesRadar+, and more. Previously to being at TechRadar Gaming, he had a short but successful stint as Games Editor at WePC, and prior to that spent more than four years at GamesRadar+, building its hardware team up from scratch to great success. Elsewhere, he is merging his passion and expertise in both gardens and landscapes and video games by crowdfunding a book on video game landscapes that you can back and pre-order now.
