Nvidia's latest AI rendering technology, DLSS 5, which recently debuted in NBA 2K27, will eventually be made available to users with RTX 40 series graphics cards. Initially, the technology is exclusive to the current-generation RTX 5000 series.
An Nvidia employee stated on the company's forums that the immediate focus is on optimizing DLSS 5 performance for the RTX 50 series. "Our current focus is on optimizing performance for the GeForce RTX 50 Series with model updates expected later this fall," the employee explained. "Once RTX 50 Series performance is more fully tuned, we plan to work on expanding official support to the GeForce RTX 40 Series." This approach suggests Nvidia aims to refine the technology on its newest hardware before retrofitting it to the Ada Lovelace architecture found in the RTX 40 series.
Initial testing of DLSS 5 in NBA 2K27 revealed a significant performance impact even on high-end hardware. On an RTX 5090, enabling DLSS 5 caused frame rates to drop from approximately 57-60 frames per second to around 37 frames per second, a reduction of about 43%. This substantial performance hit on the most powerful available card raises questions about its compatibility and performance on older models like the RTX 4080, which features less advanced Tensor Cores.
Nvidia has made considerable progress in optimizing DLSS 5 since its initial reveal in March, where it required two RTX 5090s to operate. The company now claims a fivefold improvement in model performance. Further optimization may reduce the performance impact on older hardware, but widespread support for the RTX 40 series is not expected until performance on the RTX 50 series is more thoroughly optimized.