AMD RDNA4 ray tracing features listed

Kepler_L2 shows what changes RDNA4’s GPU architecture will bring for ray tracing.

Kepler was among the first leakers to mention both the PlayStation 5 Pro specs and the fact that it uses a custom chip with AMD RDNA3 and RDNA4 features. He was also the first to claim that AMD would be dropping its plans for high-end discrete Navi 4X chips. Most, if not all, of these claims have already been confirmed either by other leakers or indirectly by AMD through their open-source software and driver updates.

The leaker is now sharing a list of new features that are said to be coming to RDNA4. We compiled the list and tried to provide possible explanations, which may be inaccurate.

AMD RDNA4 Ray Tracing Features

• Double Ray Tracing Intersect Engine – may lead to increased GPU processing for rays in parallel
• RT instance node transform – could enable GPUs to handheld geometries more efficiently (translation/rotation/scaling etc).
• 64B RT node – could improve processing and require less memory
• Ray Tracing Tri Pair optimization – could reduce computation load required to calculate ray-triangle intersections
• Change flags encoded in barycentrics to simplify detection of procedural nodes – ?
• BVH Footprint Improvement – Bounding Volume Hierarchy (BVH), potentially faster grouping of scene geometry
• RT support for OBB and Instance Node Intersection – this could refer to support for Oriented Bounding Box, which may enable higher precision and efficiency by offering smaller bounding volumes

AMD has not publicly commented on RDNA4 ray tracing capabilities. In fact, AMD has avoided mentioning this new architecture at several events since January. AMD has outlined its plans for Zen5 and Zen6 CPU architectures, which span as far as late 2025 or early 2026. However, there is no clear indication of when RDNA4 will be released for gamers.

On the other hand, PlayStation 5 Pro seems to be on schedule to launch this year, with some leakers claiming it may arrive in November. If Sony follows its marketing strategy for the PS4 Pro, the first announcements are expected in September. On the other hand, AMD Radeon RX 8000 series featuring RDNA4 are expected to be launched in early 2025, should rumors hold true.

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