AMD RDNA 3 GPUs are reportedly quite good when it comes to handling FSR 4 and will deliver slightly lower frame rates compared to other older upscaling technologies.
User Runs FSR 4 on AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT; Achieves Slightly Higher Performance Than Native, but Slightly Inferior Compared to XeSS and FSR 3.1
It's true that officially, the AMD FSR 4 can only work with RDNA 4 GPUs, aka Radeon RX 9000 series, but some workarounds have proved that the RDNA 3 GPUs can do it as well. Since the RDNA lacks FP8 AI hardware support, which is used on FSR 4, only RDNA 4 GPUs can currently support the FSR 4 feature. On Linux, enabling FSR 4 on RDNA 3 GPUs is possible through Mesa, which can enable FP8 emulation using FP16.
However, that's what's not the main concern is, but it's the common notion about RDNA 3, which suggests that RDNA 3 GPUs are incapable when it comes to running FSR 4, but that's apparently not true, at least as per what @uzzi38 has reported after testing his Radeon RX 7800 XT with AMD's latest upscaler. His testing concluded that the RDNA 3 GPUs (Radeon RX 7800 XT in this case) are powerful enough to handle the FSR 4 capabilities, delivering slightly better performance than Native.
He tested Clair Obscur at 1440p resolution with various upscaling technologies such as FSR 3, FSR 4, and XeSS on Ultra Quality preset to see how the performance with FSR 4 stacks up against FSR 3.1 and XeSS. The tool used was Optiscaler, which is a popular upscaler swapper and has recently added support for FSR 4. Now the testing shows that without any upscalers, the RX 7800 XT was delivering around 95 FPS, but with FSR 4, it increased to over 100 FPS. The FSR 3.1 and XeSS delivered higher performance with nearly 120-130 FPS, which is obvious since RDNA 3 has to emulate the FP8 via FP16 for FSR 4, which can cost a few extra FPS.
Still, the FSR 4 is a better option as even its Quality and Balanced presets offer superior visual quality and stability over FSR 3.1's Ultra Quality preset. Nonetheless, in order to conclude that the FSR 4 can be beneficial for RDNA 3, it needs to be investigated in several games. Without official support, there will be some caveats, but as shown by @uzzi38 and XDA, RDNA 3 with FSR 4 can definitely show some noticeable improvements in games.
About the author: Sarfraz Khan is a hardware reporter with a focus on PC components and the builder community. With years of experience writing about PC hardware and laptops, his work has been featured on several reputable technology publications. Sarfraz's hands-on experience is demonstrated through his first-person accounts of using and comparing different hardware configurations, providing practical and relatable insights for everyday users. His technical analysis is respected by peers in the enthusiast community and has been cited by specialized hardware sites such as Germany's Igor's Lab.
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