Ray tracing and rasterization aren’t rivals anymore but have now become collaborators. Rasterization still leads for speed and efficiency in real-time graphics, while ray tracing delivers unprecedented realism by simulating physical light behavior.While there is no publicly published 2024‑2025 adoption figure, in 2023 NVIDIA reported that 83% of RTX 40 Series users enabled ray tracing (Tweak Town). So the possibility of its use now could be even larger. The future belongs to hybrid rendering systems, where AI upscaling and selective ray tracing balance performance with photorealism.
In computer graphics, rasterization and ray tracing represent two fundamentally different ways of rendering light, geometry, and materials. Both serve the same goal, which is turning 3D data into 2D images. However, their processes could not be more distinct.
Rasterization has been the backbone of real-time computer graphics for decades. It works by converting 3D shapes, typically made up of triangles in a polygon mesh, into pixels on a framebuffer. Each pixel’s color is determined through shading algorithms that simulate how light interacts with a surface.
Rather than tracking individual rays of light, rasterization projects geometry through a camera and determines visibility using Z-buffering (or hidden-surface determination). The graphics processing unit (GPU) handles millions of these operations per frame, allowing for frame rates exceeding 120 FPS even on mid-tier hardware (Tomshardware.com).
In contrast, ray tracing mimics the physical behavior of light using optics principles. Rays are cast from the camera into the scene, bouncing between surfaces and accumulating reflections, refractions, and shadows based on materials and lighting.
Through recursive algorithms, each ray can generate secondary rays to simulate global illumination, ambient occlusion, depth of field, and caustics. The result is photorealism that captures the subtleties of reflected and refracted light on materials like glass, metal, or water, something rasterization approximates through tricks rather than physics.
The main reason rasterization still dominates is its direct link to refresh rate and frame rate performance. Games can maintain high visual quality without massive computational cost, making it ideal for competitive gaming or large-scale 3D simulations. In the example below, we see that while there is a difference with having ray tracing than just rasterization, this visual difference just does not matter in the competitive gaming world, especially when reaction time is more important.
Modern GPUs, such as those using NVIDIA’s Turing or AMD’s RDNA 2 architectures, are optimized to process triangles and textures efficiently. The shading process is highly parallel, ensuring smooth gameplay even in large, complex scenes.
Ray tracing, however, delivers a level of realism that rasterization cannot replicate. Reflections, soft shadows, and realistic lighting behave naturally, enhancing immersion. For non-competitive games or 3D showcases, rasterization is great for seeing the full beauty of the visuals.
Yet, even on top-tier GPUs like the GeForce RTX 4090, enabling full ray tracing can reduce frame rates by 20–50% (Techspot.com). So it’s important to note if frame rates are more important or not when using ray tracing. Ray tracing can still lower performance by around 30–50% compared to rasterized graphics, though AI upscaling tools like DLSS 4 are narrowing that gap.
Most modern video games now combine both methods. Engines like Unreal Engine 5 use hybrid pipelines, where ray tracing handles reflections and global illumination, while rasterization takes care of geometry and base lighting. This blend balances speed and realism, a hallmark of 2025’s gaming visuals.
Even with dedicated RT cores and hardware acceleration, ray tracing introduces noticeable performance penalties (Techspot.com). High-end GPUs can maintain playable frame rates, but mid-range cards may need compromises in resolution or visual settings.
AI-driven upscaling has redefined how gamers experience ray tracing. NVIDIA DLSS 4 and AMD FSR 3 predict frames and upscale images using machine learning, compensating for the FPS loss. In Cyberpunk 2077, enabling DLSS 4 can double frame rates with ray tracing active, turning a 40 FPS experience into over 80 FPS (Windowscentral.com).
To use ray tracing effectively, a GPU with dedicated RT acceleration (like NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 20 Series and newer or AMD’s RDNA 3 cards) is essential. Without hardware-level bounding volume hierarchy (BVH) traversal and ray-triangle intersection units, performance becomes impractically low (NVIDIA).
Rasterization thrives in environments demanding high refresh rates and instant response. It’s also compatible with nearly all graphics APIs, including DirectX, OpenGL, and Vulkan. Developers can optimize assets easily without the need for physically accurate lighting simulations. Rasterization has also come a long way and can look just as amazing as ray-tracing if done well. This video by Vex shows us some examples of this and you can see for yourself if ray tracing is really needed or preferred:
Ray tracing excels where realism matters most. It produces lifelike reflections, refractions, and shadows without relying on pre-baked lightmaps or screen-space effects. Its capacity to simulate photons and volumetric lighting allows artists to achieve film-quality visuals within a game engine. Although rasterization is capable of looking similar, there are just some aspects that ray tracing does better in, especially full ray tracing (path tracing).
Rasterization struggles with indirect lighting and accurate reflection, while ray tracing can be prohibitively expensive for large scenes. Each technique’s shortcomings explain why hybrid rendering can be the prevailing choice. Lumen, for example, is a surface cache and ray tracing hybrid that is meant to give results almost as close to path tracing in real time. From this example from JSFILMZ alone, are you able to distinguish which is path tracing and which is Lumen?
According to NVIDIA’s 2025 gaming data, 83% of desktop RTX 40 Series users enable ray tracing in supported titles, with 79% enabling DLSS (Nvidia.com).
From only very few titles supporting ray tracing in 2018, the ecosystem has expanded to over 800 (Nvidia.com). Major releases like Black Myth: Wukong, Stalker 2, and Star Wars Outlaws have made ray tracing central to their rendering pipelines.
Despite growing adoption, 47% of NVIDIA users still operate GPUs that are two or more generations old (Jonpeddie.com). For them, full ray tracing remains inaccessible without substantial performance loss.
Unreal Engine 5’s Lumen system exemplifies hybrid rendering. It uses screen-space global illumination alongside hardware ray tracing for reflections. The result is realistic lighting even on mid-tier GPUs.
Modern engines often trace only specific effects, like reflections, shadows, or ambient occlusion, while rasterizing everything else. This selective approach reduces computational load without sacrificing realism.
Microsoft’s DirectX Raytracing (DXR) and Vulkan RT have matured, providing developers with robust APIs to integrate ray tracing into games seamlessly. These frameworks standardize acceleration structures and improve interoperability between GPUs.
The RTX 50 Series GPUs deliver leading ray tracing performance with advanced path tracing support and increased RT core counts. Combined with DLSS 4, they can render fully ray-traced scenes at high refresh rates.
AMD’s RDNA 4 architecture has improved ray tracing throughput but remains slightly behind in pure ray-tracing workloads. However, its rasterization efficiency remains excellent, making it a solid value choice.
For gamers on a budget, cards like the RTX 4060 and RX 7700 XT handle hybrid rendering well at 1080p. While full path tracing is unrealistic at this tier, hybrid modes remain visually impressive and performant.
Path tracing represents the final step toward unified, physically based rendering. It traces every possible light path in a scene, producing unmatched realism. Games like Cyberpunk 2077: Overdrive Mode demonstrate what full path tracing can achieve, though the cost in computation remains high. However, hybrid rendering will most likely still be best in terms of both optimization/speed and visuals.
Recent GPU architectures include dedicated RT cores and tensor units (NVIDIA), reflecting a growing focus on ray tracing and AI workloads alongside traditional rasterization. This shift reflects the industry’s long-term trajectory toward physically accurate rendering.
According to NVIDIA, More than 870 games and applications now support RTX, including top-selling titles, widely used creative tools, and major game engines. Furthermore, over 175 games now support NVIDIA DLSS 4, with path tracing in major 2026 titles such as Resident Evil Requiem and Directive 8020 (Nvidia). Developers have embraced NVIDIA’s DLSS, ray tracing, and RTX-accelerated AI features at a record pace. So given hardware and software trends, it is likely that by the early 2030s ray tracing (or hybrid rasterization/ray tracing) will be common in many high‑end games and applications, though rasterization will probably persist alongside it for a long time.
When deciding whether to invest in a ray-tracing-capable GPU, it's important to weigh the cost against the benefits. If visual fidelity and modern game aesthetics are your priority, such an investment is worthwhile. However, for competitive or eSports players, traditional rasterization performance remains more valuable. It's also essential to consider your game library, as not all titles support ray tracing or DLSS, and genres like indie games may not benefit enough to justify the added hardware cost. Looking ahead, with rapid advancements in ray-tracing acceleration, choosing a GPU with at least second-generation RT cores is a practical way to future-proof your system, ensuring compatibility with new engines and APIs and maintaining viability for the next five years.
.avif)
