One day after The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered launched, three outlets have already run it on dozens of graphics cards and processors. ComputerBase, PC Games Hardware and TechSpot agree on the big picture. Without ray tracing the remaster runs well, and at Medium it is even faster than the original. Turn on path tracing and the limit moves from the graphics card to the CPU. CD Projekt Red has not shipped a patch yet.
Without ray tracing: faster than the original, and Radeon keeps up
ComputerBase tested in the open world on a Ryzen 7 9800X3D with Adrenalin 26.9.2 and GeForce 617.14. At 1440p on maximum settings without ray tracing, with upscaling at half resolution, the RTX 5090 averages 176.9 fps, the RX 9070 XT 143.4 and the RTX 5080 130.4. In plain raster, Radeon cards beat the GeForce cards they compete with, and even the RTX 5060 and Arc B580 stay above 60 fps.
TechSpot put the remaster against the old version at Medium: at 4K the new one is 45 to 58 percent faster while looking clearly better. Ultra is a different story. At 1440p the RTX 5070 Ti loses 23 percent against the original and the RX 9070 XT loses 10.
With path tracing, the CPU decides
PC Games Hardware tested 25 processors in Toussaint at maximum settings with path tracing on an RTX 5090. Only the latest Ryzen chips with 3D V-Cache averaged more than 60 fps, with the 9800X3D at 70.7. The Core i9-14900KS stopped at 59.2, the Ryzen 7 7800X3D at 58.9 and the Ryzen 5 5600 at 36.3. By PCGH's count, regular ray tracing instead of path tracing frees up more than 30 percent of CPU performance, and switching ray tracing off entirely adds more than 137 percent: a Core i9-12900K climbs from 45.9 to 108.7 fps.
ComputerBase also calls crowded towns hard on the processor. TechSpot, though, found something an ordinary CPU limit does not explain. On the RT Ultra preset the fastest GeForce cards and the RX 9070 XT hit a wall at roughly 94 fps; with path tracing at 1080p the RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 sit at 62, while CPU usage peaks at only about 35 percent. That looks like a cap inside the engine, and only a patch can lift it.
How much VRAM you need
Here the outlets disagree, because they measured different modes. According to ComputerBase, 8 GB is enough for 1440p at maximum settings without ray tracing, and 4K needs 12 GB. PCGH looked at path tracing: 12 GB up to 1440p, 16 GB for higher resolutions and for frame generation. When memory ran out, PCGH saw missing geometry and crashes. TechSpot shows the gap on a single card: with RT Ultra at 1440p the 16 GB RTX 5060 Ti gets 56 fps and the 8 GB model 32.
Steam Deck, and what to change on PC
On Steam Deck the remaster is slower than the original. PCGH, citing Steam Deck HQ, lists four scenes that average 49 fps against 56.5 for the old version, and about 44 in regular play, so a 40 fps cap makes sense. Valve has not rated the remaster for Deck yet.
If the game runs badly on your PC, this is what the tests point to:
- Radeon. Install Adrenalin 26.9.2 first. On 26.9.1 the game renders with glitches, and on the new driver ComputerBase measured 3 percent more with ray tracing and 5 percent more with path tracing.
- Ray tracing. ComputerBase suggests its own mix: RT lighting on Performance, reflections on, RT shadows and ambient occlusion off. With it the RTX 5070 Ti gets 86.3 fps at 1440p and the RX 9070 XT 85.
- 8 GB cards. Leave ray tracing off, or frame rates drop by almost half.
- Path tracing. Even the Core i9-14900KS and Ryzen 7 7800X3D fall short of 60 fps with it, so on a slower CPU pick regular ray tracing. Path-traced hair works only on the RTX 50 series and costs about 5 percent.
According to PCGH, CD Projekt Red has already promised patches for the shadow artefacts on vegetation. What else the remaster changes and how to go back to the old version is in our launch story. The game has DLSS 4.5 but no DLSS 5; for DLSS 5 and the mods around it, see our separate guide.
Sources
ComputerBase GPU test, 28.09.2026, updated 30.09.2026. PC Games Hardware GPU and CPU test, 28.09.2026. PC Games Hardware on VRAM, 29.09.2026. PC Games Hardware on Steam Deck, citing Steam Deck HQ, 29.09.2026. TechSpot GPU benchmark, 29.09.2026. AMD Adrenalin 26.9.2 release notes. CD Projekt Red changelog on Steam. Screenshots from the official Steam gallery.
