Best Graphics Card 2017

While the processor segment saw lots of action, the GPU industry has been rather dull when looking back, but certainly not because new GPUs weren't launched. NVIDIA expanded its "Pascal" GPU family with its range-topping GTX 1080 Ti, which finally makes 4K gaming possible with today's AAA titles, while AMD finally launched its new Radeon RX Vega family, besides the re-branded RX 500 family for lower-mainstream segments. It's just that AMD's RX Vega has been less competitive than expected and NVIDIA continued to expand its lead for its enthusiast-grade GPUs. Nevertheless, there's been real competition among custom-design graphics card makers on who could come up with the quietest, fastest, and most energy-efficient designs. We have a few picks.

Winner: MSI GeForce GTX 1080 Ti Lightning Z

The GeForce GTX 1080 Ti is this year's best GPU as it finally enables 4K gaming with today's AAA games without having to take the multi-GPU route. We've tested a lot of GTX 1080 Ti custom designs, and I find that the MSI Lightning Z is the highlight. It begins with the card's mesmerizing RGB lighting, which is the best implementation on any graphics card I've seen to date. This card is designed for those who neither want to dabble with liquid cooling or manually overclock their GTX 1080 Ti, and want it both fast and quiet, straight out of the box. The card comes with both GPU and memory overclocked and can handle high clocks with ease thanks to its large triple-slot, triple-fan cooler, which is also very quiet.

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Runner-up: AMD Radeon Vega 56

AMD's Vega lineup has been hyped beyond reality in the months and weeks prior to its actual launch, which led to a majority of AMD's fanbase being disappointed by the outcome, which is decent, but not enough to conclusively match or beat NVIDIA's offerings. The Vega launch was also plagued by extremely limited supply, with the few available boards being sold at unrealistic prices. Even today, Vega availability is scarce (if you are an optimist), which will drive even more gamers to the green camp. That said, the Radeon Vega 56 is a very decent card that is faster than the GTX 1070 and more affordable than the GTX 1070 Ti if you can find it at its $399 MSRP. NVIDIA does have better power/heat/noise, which might be more important than price or availability for some.

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Looking forward to 2018

For 2018, I do wish for AMD to improve their presence in the GPU business to bring back the competition. Realistically speaking though, it looks like NVIDIA will again manage to expand their lead. If it weren't for the mining boom, AMD's PC GPU division would be in trouble, and I wouldn't be surprised if the company just gave up on the PC gaming market at some point to free up resources for making better console chips. The recently released Titan V, which is built upon NVIDIA's new Volta architecture, set a new price record: $3,000, which could be a hint of things to come. I also think that we can expect more limitations for board partners, like the forbidden out of the box overclock on the GTX 1070 Ti. 2018 should also be the year when we'll see new DirectX 12 titles, some built from the ground up on the new API, which will shed light on whether DX12 is actually worth it for both developers and gamers, or whether exciting gaming experiences don't depend on the graphics API used. A secondary battlefield in the GPU wars is the software suite that's provided by the GPU vendor. AMD made huge improvements here with Adrenalin Edition, which adds an in-game overlay with FPS and sensor reporting; NVIDIA pioneered in-game video capturing and streaming. It seems users want more and more features integrated directly into their drivers, and GPU companies are listening, hoping to gain the edge over the competition. I believe this will lead to even more features being added to drivers in 2018, hopefully without bloating them too much.