GeForce RTX 3050: FPS benchmarks and laptop guide

The GeForce RTX 3050 is the most widespread RTX record in this catalog — 230 matched models carry it, making it the volume card of the current budget-gaming generation. This guide covers its 29 benchmarked games at 1080p on high (13 with medium-preset data), the machines that carry it, and the honest ceiling of Ampere's entry rung.

Where the GeForce RTX 3050 sits in 2026

A catalog score of 63.1 ranks the RTX 3050 at 70th of 341 — the top fifth of the table. Its neighbors are the cards shoppers actually cross-shop: the GTX 1660 Ti (63.7), RTX 3070 Ti (63.6) and Radeon RX 7700S (63.2) just above; the RTX 500 Ada Generation (62.6), its own 6GB variant (61.9) and the Quadro RTX 4000 Max-Q (61.8) just below. The catalog also keeps 27 head-to-head comparison pages pitting it against everything from the GTX 1650 to the RTX 5070.

What the chip brings

This is Ampere architecture (the GA107 chip) on Samsung's 8nm process: 2048 CUDA cores with second-generation RT and tensor cores, a boost clock of 1343MHz, and 4GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus delivering 192GB/s — inside a 75W envelope that lets it live in genuinely thin machines. Peak throughput is 5.5 teraflops; PassMark rates it at 11878 with Time Spy at 4497 and Fire Strike at 11949. Resizable BAR support is flagged in the record. The specification that matters most in 2026, though, is the 4GB buffer — the defining constraint of this class.

FPS in games at 1080p

At the high preset the esports tier is emphatic: Counter-Strike 2 at 170 fps, Valorant at 150, DOTA 2 at 118, Fortnite at 110 — and the legacy capped quartet (CS:GO, Overwatch, GTA V, PUBG) at their 240/140 ceilings. The interesting middle: F1 2021 at 105 (127 on medium), Battlefield 5 at 93, Forza Horizon 4 at 90, F1 23 at 87 (109) and Forza Horizon 5 at 87. Modern heavyweights land in the playable band: The Witcher 3 at 81, Far Cry 5 at 68 (76 on medium), Cyberpunk 2077 at 66 on high, Baldur's Gate 3 at 45 (50), Metro Exodus at 49 and the Resident Evil 4 remake at 50. The pattern is consistent — 1080p high works nearly everywhere, with texture-heavy titles occasionally needing a settings pass to fit the 4GB frame buffer.

Laptops that carry it

The 230-model roster is the largest around any single GPU record in the catalog, dominated by the 2025 generation: HP Victus 15 at $1256, Acer's Nitro V 15/16 and Nitro Lite 16 at $1440, ASUS TUF Gaming F16 at $1440, Lenovo's LOQ 15ARP10E at $1440, HP Victus 15 (2025) at $1440, the OMEN 16 Slim at $1665 and Alienware 16 Aurora at $2220 — plus business machines like HP's ProBook 4 and EliteBook 6 G1i at $1144 that use the card for its thin-and-quiet 75W profile. The fleet medians describe modern mid-range machines: best-GPU score 72.7, gaming index 72, USComp score 78.5, with current CPUs averaging 87.6.

Bottom line

The RTX 3050 is the pragmatic default of budget gaming in 2026: DLSS support, a 75W envelope that fits serious power into affordable machines, and a 1080p high-preset table that clears 60 fps in nearly everything short of the heaviest modern titles. Its ceiling is equally clear — the 4GB buffer is the constraint that separates it from the step-up cards, and shoppers chasing maximum settings in newest releases should budget for a 6GB-plus tier. For everyone else, the enormous host roster means aggressive competition among listings, and $1256–1440 buys a current-generation machine that games honestly.