GPUs Under $20?

I wanted to see what kind of performance you can actually get from the absolute cheapest GPUs on Amazon, so I grabbed five sub‑$20 cards and put them head‑to‑head in a full benchmark showdown. If you’re curious how far bargain‑bin hardware can really go, these tests reveal which ultra‑budget GPU delivers the most value for the least money:

Welcome to The Bargain Bin Showdown! We’ve gathered together five of the cheapest GPUs on Amazon to battle head to head to see which card will reign supreme. To qualify for this benchmarking competition, each GPU must meet the following strict standards:

One, each card must cost under 20 dollars US.

Two, each card must be readily available on Amazon.

Three, each card must support at least DirectX 11.

Four, each card must have at least one gigabyte of memory.

So let’s run through the lineup and take a look at each of our promising contestants. First up is the AMD Radeon HD 7570. Next is the Nvidia Quadro 600. Next is the AMD Radeon R5 240. Next up is the Nvidia GeForce GT 610. Last but not least is the AMD FirePro V4900. The Nvidia NVS 315 was slated to participate; however, after failing to complete multiple benchmark tests, it was disqualified.

Now let’s put each of our remaining contestants through five different benchmark tests to see how they stack up. First up is 3DMark 06 running at 720p in the lowest settings. Some of the cards had a tough time getting through the newer versions of 3DMark, so we stuck with 3DMark 06. Looking at the results, the FirePro V4900 comes out on top, with the HD 7570 not far behind. The Quadro 600 edges out the R5 240 for third place, while the GT 610 trails the group.

Now let’s take a look at some of the other benchmarks and see if the results stay the same. Next up is Unigine Superposition running at 720p and the Low preset. Looking at the results, the V4900 is once again in first while the HD 7570 takes a solid second. Interestingly, with this test, the R5 240 now passes the Quadro 600 to take third place. The GT 610 still trails behind.

Next up is GraphicsBench 5 running the Aztec Ruins test using DirectX 11 mode. Looking at the results shows a very similar picture to the last benchmark test. It’s not looking too good for the GT 610 unfortunately. I guess that’s not surprising, as the Nvidia 10 series cards have always had a reputation for being somewhat low performers.

Next up we’ve got the Resident Evil 6 Benchmark tool running at 720p in the lowest settings. Results here show a very similar breakdown in scores to what we saw with GraphicsBench. Each card maintains its ranking.

Let’s see if anything shakes up in the next test. For the next test, it’s the CS:GO Benchmark map running at 720p in the lowest settings. With this test, rather than just looking at arbitrary scores, we can see what that performance equates to in real world frame rates. Comparing each card’s FPS, we can see the V4900 dominate the group yet again. The HD 7570 places a solid second as usual, and the R5 240 edges out the Quadro 600 once more.

So there you have it. Congratulations to the AMD FirePro V4900, currently the best GPU to be had on Amazon for under 20 dollars. Now, would I recommend anyone go out and buy one of these cards right now? Not unless you really have to. Cards with only one gigabyte of memory are going to be limited going forward.

By expanding your budget by just another 10 to 20 dollars, far more powerful options begin to open up. Cards with two gigabytes or even four gigabytes of memory are possible. Cards like the Nvidia GeForce GT 730 2GB and the AMD Radeon R7 450 4GB can both be found for under 40 dollars US.

That being said, please feel free to leave a comment on the video if you’ve personally used any of the cards in this list, and thank you for watching!

Programs used for benchmarking:

https://benchmark.unigine.com/superposition
https://benchmarks.ul.com/legacy-benchmarks
https://gfxbench.com/result.jsp
https://store.steampowered.com/app/229950/Resident_Evil_6_Benchmark_Tool/
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=500334237