Hogwarts Legacy review: notebook and desktop benchmarks
Technical review
Against all preemptive scepticism, the developers of Hogwarts Legacy have managed to bring the famous and much-loved magical world to our screens - high quality in both gameplay and technical form. Even if you are not a fan of the Harry Potter universe, the graphics of the game are sure to impress like no other. Alongside the textures, the lighting and effects (such as magic spells) are also astounding.
In outside areas of the game, the draw distance is great and the vegetation density is impressive. However, the absolute highlight of Hogwarts Legacy remains its keen eye for detail - or in other words - its obsession with detail, which shows the enormous effort it took to develop the game and provides a first-class experience for the player.
Content-wise, the game can't be critiqued much either. The combat system, for example, is very fluid and intuitive. The contrast of the occasional puzzle fits in nicely and provides good variety to the game. Additionally, the school day is accompanied by atmospheric background music and good voice acting. The introduction (although a bit long) succeeds in captivating even casual gamers and gently introduces the player to the numerous mechanics and features of the game.
PC users get to benefit from a comprehensive options menu. Beginning with the display tab, where players can set the resolution (although sadly there is no traditional full-screen mode), edge smoothing, VSync and frame rate limit. Depending on the graphics card, this menu also includes FSR and DLSS. The graphics tab shows a similar number of options. Included here are four presets, which influence the ten individual settings below. If needed, the supported ray tracing (reflections, shadows and ambient occlusion) has to be activated manually.
A bonus: With the exception of ray tracing, all changes are implemented immediately and without having to restart the game. The short explanations given for each of the options also prove to be a nice detail. Annoyingly, shaders (which you might know from other games such as Call of Duty or Uncharted) are loaded every time the game is booted up. On some devices, this can take a few minutes to reach completion.
Benchmark
Because the option to "run benchmark" in the menu only consists of a short background hardware analysis, we will rely on a set sequence to test the performance. After the lengthy tutorial, the player is allowed to leave the area and explore the outside world. The main quest for the main character is to set out for Hogsmeade with their companion by their side. With the help of the tool CapFrameX, we record frame rates as we sprint through the garden until the paled gate, for roughly 25 seconds (see video).
Results
FHD (1,920 x 1,080)
If the computer only has an iGPU to work with, the player will have to get used to experiencing low resolutions and details - if the game even runs at all. Even the Radeon 680M, which is very powerful as far as integrated graphics adapters go, doesn't manage to run the game at over 40 FPS in Full HD (1,280 x 720 pixels are, however, quite playable on the low preset). To run the game at mid to maximum settings, at least a mid-range graphics card is required, similar in specs to the Radeon RX 6600M.
Hogwarts Legacy | |
1920x1080 Low Preset AA:Low T 1920x1080 Medium Preset AA:High T 1920x1080 High Preset AA:High T 1920x1080 Ultra Preset AA:High T | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, i9-12900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Laptop GPU, i9-12900HX | |
AMD Radeon RX 6800M, R9 5900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU, i7-12700H | |
AMD Radeon RX 6600M, R7 5800H | |
AMD Radeon 680M, R9 6900HS |
QHD (2,560 x 1,440)
If you want to play Hogwarts Legacy in QHD at 2,560 x 1,440 pixels and using the Ultra preset, you cannot avoid having to use a laptop or a PC with mid to high specs, such as the GeForce RTX 3060 (Laptop) or the Radeon RX 6800M.
Hogwarts Legacy | |
2560x1440 Ultra Preset AA:High T | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, i9-12900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Laptop GPU, i9-12900HX | |
AMD Radeon RX 6800M, R9 5900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU, i7-12700H | |
AMD Radeon RX 6600M, R7 5800H |
UHD (3,840 x 2,160)
Almost all notebook graphics cards struggle to run the game at the highest settings in 4K. Even the top-of-the-range model of Nvidia's latest generation, the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti, fails at the 40 FPS mark.
Hogwarts Legacy | |
3840x2160 Ultra Preset AA:High T | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, i9-12900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Laptop GPU, i9-12900HX | |
AMD Radeon RX 6800M, R9 5900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU, i7-12700H | |
AMD Radeon RX 6600M, R7 5800H |
Ray Tracing
The game becomes even harder to run when ray tracing is activated. While a GeForce RTX 3080 (Laptop) is sufficient for Full HD, even top-of-the-range PCs reach their limits at 4K (see Radeon RX 7900 XTX).
Hogwarts Legacy | |
1920x1080 Ultra Preset + Full Ray Tracing AA:High T 3840x2160 Ultra Preset + Full Ray Tracing AA:High T | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, i9-12900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070, i9-12900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti Laptop GPU, i9-12900HX | |
AMD Radeon RX 6800M, R9 5900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Laptop GPU, i7-12700H | |
AMD Radeon RX 6600M, R7 5800H |
Note
Since gaming tests are very time-consuming and often restricted by installation or activation limits, we can only provide you with a part of the benchmarks at the time of publishing this article. More graphics cards will be added to our tables in the coming days and weeks.
Overview
Test systems
Device | Graphics card | Processor | Memory | Operating system |
---|---|---|---|---|
Notebooks | ||||
MSI Titan GT77 12UHS | Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti @175 W TGP (16 GB GDDR6) | Intel Core i9-12900HX | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 | Windows 11 |
Lenovo Legion 5 Pro | Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 @140 W TGP (6 GB GDDR6) | Intel Core i7-12700H | 2 x 8 GB DDR5 | Windows 11 |
Asus ROG Strix G15 | AMD Radeon RX 6800M (12 GB GDDR6) | AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX | 2 x 8 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Lenovo Legion 5 | AMD Radeon RX 6600M (8 GB GDDR6) | AMD Ryzen 7 5800H | 2 x 8 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 | AMD Radeon 680M | AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 | Windows 11 |
Tower PCs | ||||
Custom I | AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX (24 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT (20 GB GDDR6) MSI GeForce RTX 3080 (10 GB GDDR6X) MSI GeForce RTX 3070 (8 GB GDDR6) |
Intel Core i9-12900K | 2 x 16 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Custom II | Palit GeForce RTX 4090 GameRock OC (24 GB GDDR6X) Nvidia GeForce RTX 3090 FE (24 GB GDDR6X) Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (8 GB GDDR6X) Nvidia Titan RTX (24 GB GDDR6) Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070 Super (8 GB GDDR6)Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Super (8 GB GDDR6) KFA2 GeForce GTX 1660 Super (6 GB GDDR6) PNY GeForce GTX 1660 (6 GB GDDR5) KFA2 GeForce GTX 1650 Super (4 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 6950 XT (16 GB DDR6) AMD Radeon RX 6800 (16 GB DDR6) AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT (12 GB DDR6) AMD Radeon RX 6650 XT (8 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 6600 (8 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT (8 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 5700 (8 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT (6 GB GDDR6) AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT (8 GB GDDR6) |
AMD Ryzen 9 7950X | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 | Windows 11 |
Custom III | Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Super FE | Intel Core i9-11900K | 2 x 8 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Mini-PCs | ||||
Zotac ZBOX CI665 Nano | Intel Iris Xe Graphics G7 (96 EUs) | Intel Core i7-1165G7 | 2 x 8 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Morefine S500+ | AMD Radeon RX Vega 8 | AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX | 2 x 16 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Minisforum NUCXi7 | Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 @125 W TGP (8 GB GDDR6) | Intel Core i7-11800H | 2 x 8 GB DDR4 | Windows 11 |
Minisforum HX99G | AMD Radeon RX 6600M @100 W TGP (8 GB GDDR6) | AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 | Windows 11 |
4K monitors | Nvidia drivers | AMD drivers |
---|---|---|
Philips Brilliance 329P9H, Gigabyte M32U | ForceWare 528.49 | Adrenalin 23.2.2 |