According to Blaze Trends, for many people, the deciding factor in whether or not they upgrade to Windows 11 is performance. Whether it’s for gaming, graphics or entertainment, getting the most out of your PC is something everyone wants. In this respect, things initially looked good for Windows 11 as the first benchmarks announced it was faster than its predecessor. However, when going deeper, things started to change.
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Windows 11 performance on PCs with AMD Ryzen CPUs is reduced but not too big Screenshots |
The test was performed with a PC using AMD Ryzen 9 3900X processor, Asus ROG Strix X570-E Gaming motherboard, G.Skill TridentZ CL16 RAM (2 x 8 GB DDR4-3600), AMD graphics card Radeon RX 6700 XT, 1TB PNY CS3030 SSD (M.2 NVMe), Thermaltake Toughpower iRGB Plus 1050W PSU, and BeQuiet liquid cooling! Pure Loop 280.
The use of AMD Ryzen processors for testing is an important detail to understand the results obtained by reports showing that Windows 11 limits the performance of Ryzen CPUs. And of course this number may change after the patch from Microsoft is deployed. Additionally, depending on whether VBS and HCVI are enabled, system performance may vary.
Round 1: CPU Performance
Starting with the general performance evaluation of the CPU on Windows 11. The results show that it is not really good when in most of the tests performed, the new operating system lags behind. This observation is especially evident on 7-zip, with up to 25% less performance than Windows 10.
Apart from the 7-zip case, only Blender showed noticeable difficulties on Windows 11 with nearly 10% less performance. Meanwhile, 3DMark indicates that the new operating system is 5% slower on average than its predecessor.
Windows 10 |
Windows 11 |
Windows 11 (VBS) |
Windows 11 (VBS + HVCI) |
|
7-zip (MIPS) |
111673 |
103.000 (-7,77%) |
99,609 (-10,80%) |
100013 (-10,44%) |
7-zip (SPECwks 3.1.0) |
1,6 |
1,26 (-21,25%) |
1,26 (-21,25%) |
1,19 (-25,62%) |
PCMark 10 |
7439 |
7383 (-0,75%) |
7137 (-4,06%) |
7,055 (-5,16%) |
Cinebench R20 ST |
513,37 |
509,37 (-0,78%) |
509,55 (-0,74%) |
507,48 (-1,15%) |
Cinebench R20 MT |
7126,3 |
7.012,99 (-1,59%) |
6.849,15 (-3,89%) |
6.806,69 (-4,48%) |
Blender (SPECwks 3.1.0) |
1,89 |
1,8 (-4,76%) |
1,71 (-9,52%) |
1,71 (-9,52%) |
Handbrake (SPECwks 3.1.0) |
2,54 |
2,53 (-0,39%) |
2,47 (-2,76%) |
2,47 (-2,76%) |
LuxRender (SPECwks 3.1.0) |
5,72 |
5,91 (3,32%) |
5,41 (-5,42%) |
5,32 (-6,99%) |
3DMark TimeSpy (CPU Score) |
11923 |
11945 (0,18%) |
11,519 (-3,39%) |
11.451 (-3,96%) |
3DMark TimeSpy Extreme (CPU Score) |
6707 |
6769 (0,92%) |
6695 (-0,18%) |
6656 (-0,76%) |
3DMark FireStrike |
29610 |
29505 (-0,35%) |
28149 (-4,93%) |
28.177 (-4,84%) |
3DMark FireStrike Extreme |
29567 |
29.277 (-0,98%) |
28.241 (-4,48%) |
28.181 (-4,69%) |
3DMark FireStrike Ultra |
29562 |
28741 (-2,78%) |
28335 (-4,15%) |
28.365 (-4,05%) |
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Based on the comparison table, at the moment, Windows 11 is performing less efficiently than its predecessor at most tasks.
Round 2: Gaming performance
Switch to game mode, which recent reports found that Windows 11 slows down gaming performance by up to 28%. The culprit here is VBS – a somewhat resource-intensive security feature. So that’s why the assessment differentiates when VBS is enabled as well as it does with HCVI, which relies on VBS to function.
Reviews show that while it’s a performance drop, it’s not catastrophic. On average, it still lags its predecessor, especially when affected by VBS as the score almost always drops, and even lower when HCVI is activated.
The biggest drop was observed for Far Cry 5 which got 8.4% lower. On the other hand, some games, like Ashes of the Singularity, performed very well, where it hit the mark. The result is 7% higher than Windows 10.
Windows 10 |
Windows 11 |
Windows 11 (VBS) |
Windows 11 (VBS + HVCI) |
|
Ashes of the Singularity: Leo thang |
86,7 |
85,5 (-1,38%) |
90,1 (3,92%) |
92,8 (7,04%) |
Shadow of the Tomb Raider |
146 |
1,26 (-0,68%) |
136 (-6,85%) |
137 (-6,16%) |
Civilization VI |
189,5 |
189,9 (0,21%) |
189,8 (0,16%) |
182,2 (-3,85%) |
Wolfenstein: Youngblood |
281,5 |
279,5 (-0,71%) |
278 (-1,24%) |
277,5 (-1,42%) |
The Riftbreaker |
355,16 |
351,52 (-1,02%) |
351,73 (-0,97%) |
352,6 (-0,72%) |
Far cry 5 |
119 |
119 |
109 (-8,40%) |
112 (-5,88%) |
Far cry 6 |
113 |
113 |
108 (-4,42%) |
109 (-3,54%) |
The Division 2 |
135 |
136 (0,74%) |
136 (0,74%) |
135 |
Watch Dogs Legion |
104 |
103 (-0,96%) |
100 (-3,85%) |
99 (-4,81%) |
Borderlands 3 |
133,1 |
128 (-3,83%) |
132,1 (-0,75%) |
133,4 (0,23%) |
Crysis Remastered |
64.4 |
64,3 (-0,16%) |
63,4 (-1,55%) |
62,4 (-3,11%) |
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