Modders Are Already Getting Nvidia DLSS 5 Running on AMD Radeon GPUs
Nvidia’s DLSS 5 is officially meant for RTX 50-series GPUs, but of course, PC modders looked at that wall and immediately started climbing it.
A GitHub project called DLSS-NR-on-AMD is trying to make DLSS 5 Neural Rendering work on AMD Radeon hardware, specifically Radeon RX 9000 and RX 7000 series GPUs. This is not an official Nvidia or AMD feature. It is an unofficial modding effort, and right now it is still very much in alpha territory.
Still, the pace is pretty wild.
According to Tom’s Hardware, the project uses a full reimplementation of the neural network runtime for AMD GPU architectures. The developer says it currently works with DirectX 12 games that use FSR, with Cyberpunk 2077 and GTA V Enhanced listed among the tested games.
The early numbers show both the promise and the pain. YouTube channel Ancient Gameplays tested Cyberpunk 2077 on a Radeon RX 9070 XT. Without DLSS 5 Neural Rendering, the game was running above 80 FPS. Once the unofficial DLSS 5 implementation was enabled, performance initially crashed to around 11–12 FPS.
That is not “slightly rough”. That is straight-up unplayable, bro.
But the interesting part is how quickly the project improved. Alpha 0.3.3 reportedly brought a 23% performance uplift, and Alpha 0.4.0 followed with another 42% improvement over that previous version. Put together, that works out to roughly a 74% jump in just 24 hours.
Ancient Gameplays then tested Alpha 0.4.0 in Cyberpunk 2077 at 3440 x 1440, where the Radeon GPU reached around 50 FPS. That is a massive step up from the earlier roughly 30 FPS result, although it still trails far behind the game’s performance with Neural Rendering turned off.
The project is also becoming less sakit kepala to install. A launcher called AMDNR can automate much of the setup, so users do not need to manually copy and replace DLL files for each game. It also supports different runtimes and offers extra options through the OptiScaler interface.
Why this matters
Analysis/inference: For Malaysia and SEA PC gamers, this is worth watching because upscaling and frame-generation tech increasingly affects real-world GPU value. A feature that is officially locked to one hardware ecosystem can shape buying decisions, especially for players who care about ray tracing, high refresh rates, or ultrawide gaming.
But let’s not get carried away yet. This is not a clean DLSS 5-for-everyone moment. The project is alpha, game support can vary, and performance is still far from native or official implementation. It is cool, but not something most players should treat as a stable everyday solution right now.
The bigger story is pressure. If modders can already get early DLSS 5 Neural Rendering experiments running on Radeon hardware, even messily, it raises questions about what AMD, Nvidia, and the wider PC gaming ecosystem do next. The developer has also reportedly told Ancient Gameplays that another major update is in the works, with a substantial Radeon performance boost expected.
For now, this is one of those classic PC gaming moments: unofficial, messy, technically impressive, and maybe a glimpse of where GPU features are heading.
