Nvidia's RTX technologies are now supported by 500 games and apps, with more to come

Alan Wake with a glowing bullet hole in his forehead in Alan Wake 2.
(Image credit: Remedy Entertainment)

Nvidia has announced that its groundbreaking suite of RTX technologies is now supported by over 500 games and applications. Beginning in 2018, features such as ray tracing, AI and upscaling have gone from a niche to being an integral part of PC gaming.

Nvidia maintains a list of games and apps that support RTX technologies. At this point in time, there are 380 games supporting some type of ray tracing or DLSS. There are just two, Alan Wake 2 and Cyberpunk 2077 that support path ray tracing and DLSS 3.5 with ray reconstruction, though that number is sure to increase. Both are stunning to behold on a card like the RTX 4090.

The first RTX graphics cards launched in 2018, beginning with the RTX 20-series. It touted ray tracing as the future of graphics. So confident was Nvidia, it dropped its long running GTX nomenclature. But ray tracing is punishing on any GPU (and it still is) , so to boost performance Nvidia developed the other major RTX technology: DLSS, or Deep Learning Super Sampling. It's an AI-trained upscaling solution that aims to boost performance levels, particularly when ray tracing effects are enabled.

In the early days, ray tracing and DLSS support was limited and it required significant developer resources. I was skeptical at the time because I've always preferred an open ecosystem over proprietary technologies. I still do, but RTX is here to stay, and the future of PC gaming is bright. 

DLSS 1 came and went quickly. DLSS 2 is still by far the most adopted DLSS version, but arguably it's the RTX 40 exclusive DLSS 3 that's the real deal, as it adds Frame Generation into the mix. Now that AMD has introduced its competing Fluid Motion Frames technology, we can expect frame generation to become an ever more integral part of PC gaming.

Your next upgrade

Nvidia RTX 4070 and RTX 3080 Founders Edition graphics cards

(Image credit: Future)

Best CPU for gaming: The top chips from Intel and AMD.
Best gaming motherboard: The right boards.
Best graphics card: Your perfect pixel-pusher awaits.
Best SSD for gaming: Get into the game ahead of the rest.

At PC Gamer, our reviews tend to emphasize native benchmarking in order to provide apples to apples comparisons. If you're gaming with something like an RTX 4060 at 2560 x 1440, some benchmark results at high settings make it look average, but with DLSS and Frame Generation enabled, it can easily double your frame rates. 

Cards like the RTX 4060 and RTX 4060 Ti will be found in PCs for many years to come, and Nvidia deserves credit for continuing to improve DLSS. This "free" performance will extend the playable life of such cards. We have no idea what technologies a major game like GTA 6 will support, but when it does eventually launch for PCs in the years ahead, there will be millions of RTX 20, 30 and 40-series desktop and laptops playing it, and DLSS will give these ageing GPUs a very welcome FPS boost in what is expected to be a demanding game.

Where will PC gaming graphics go next? We're not at the photo-realism stage of things yet, but the architectures of today are laying the foundations of the architectures of the future. RTX is paving the way.

Chris Szewczyk
Hardware Writer

Chris' gaming experiences go back to the mid-nineties when he conned his parents into buying an 'educational PC' that was conveniently overpowered to play Doom and Tie Fighter. He developed a love of extreme overclocking that destroyed his savings despite the cheaper hardware on offer via his job at a PC store. To afford more LN2 he began moonlighting as a reviewer for VR-Zone before jumping the fence to work for MSI Australia. Since then, he's gone back to journalism, enthusiastically reviewing the latest and greatest components for PC & Tech Authority, PC Powerplay and currently Australian Personal Computer magazine and PC Gamer. Chris still puts far too many hours into Borderlands 3, always striving to become a more efficient killer.

Read more
A screenshot taken from the 2025 Nvidia tech demo Zorah
Nvidia RTX 50-series and dev kit show that rasterization is old news and we're now firmly in the era of AI rendering
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang holding an RTX 50-series card.
92% of Nvidia users turn on DLSS... if they've been lucky enough to bag an RTX 50-series card at launch AND have the Nvidia App installed
Doomslayer pointing a gun at demons while giants fight in the background
Ray tracing is quickly becoming inescapable and I think it's time we bit the bullet and embraced it
Collage of images to represent Nvidia's RTX AI PCs
I'll say it: The best thing I saw from Nvidia at CES wasn't its sweet new GPUs, but some tasty AI every RTX gamer can enjoy
Screenshots from Half-Life 2 RTX, showing the various new effects delivered by full ray tracing and enhanced assets.
Microsoft announces DirectX Raytracing 1.2 claiming 'game changing' performance benefits but it looks like the important stuff is already in Nvidia's RTX GPUs, even the old ones
A photo of Nvidia's Zorah graphics demo running a large gaming monitor
Nvidia's expanded Zorah demo tells us how AI is the future of graphics: 'There's no rasterization going on at all. This is all ray traced and the amazing part is that it's actually faster than rasterizing'
Latest in Hardware
A woman wearing a VR headset with dramatic, colourful lighting across the background
'World’s smallest LEDs' could lead to accurately lit screens with 127,000 pixels per inch and much more immersive VR
The NES themed 8BitDo Retro mechanical gaming keyboard on a blue background
I love the 8BitDo Retro C64 keyboard but I'd pick its cheaper NES-themed model near its lowest price ever during Amazon's Big Spring Sale
The snazzy red and black HyperX Cloud Alpha wireless headphones float in a teal void. The microphone is attached to the headset.
The best wireless gaming headset is now even better in the Amazon Big Spring Sale, boasting a more than $50 discount
A chip being held up in an Intel fab
Intel is reportedly 'working to finalize commitments from Nvidia' as a foundry partner, suggesting gaming potential for the 18A node
Amazon box
Don't panic! The 'Do Not Send Voice Recordings' option Amazon just removed was only used by 0.03% of customers and they can still have it
Digital generated image of people surrounded by interactive transparent and glowing panels with data. Visualising smart technology, blockchain and artificial intelligence
Now I shall demand the cookies! Proposed new browsing agreement turns the tables and lets users dictate terms to websites
Latest in News
Lara Croft Unified Art
Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics lays off 17 employees 'to better align our current business needs and the studio's future success'
A long bendy arm stealing money from people in a subway car
'You're a very long arm. You steal things. It's a comedy game,' explains developer of comedy game where you steal things with a very long arm
The heroes are attacked by monsters
Pillars of Eternity is getting turn-based combat to mark its 10th anniversary, and that means PC Gamer editors will soon be arguing about combat mechanics again
Image of Ronaldo from Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves trailer
It doesn't really make sense that soccer star Ronaldo is now a Fatal Fury character, but if you follow the money you can see how it happened
Junah beginning a battle in Metaphor: ReFantazio.
Today's RPG fans are 'very sensitive to feeling like they wasted time' when they die, says Metaphor: ReFantazio battle planner—but Atlus still made combat hard anyway
Image of Cersei Lanniser from Game of Thrones: Kingsroad Steam early access trailer
A new Game of Thrones RPG is coming to Steam today with a cast of 'familiar faces,' which is good because it's really the only way to tell it's a GoT game at all