Best CPU & GPU Combos For Streaming! (Mid-2024) 🔥

Building a new streaming PC is both an exhilarating and stressful milestone in your streaming journey. The investment is substantial, and choosing the wrong components can lead to game lag, stream stutter, and a decline in viewership. Among all PC components, the CPU and GPU are the most crucial. If they don’t work well together, you’ll face bottlenecking and regret your purchase. Don’t worry — this blog post covers the best CPU and GPU combos for a smooth streaming experience.

What Combos to Expect

The combos featured here have minimal to no bottlenecks and will handle your favorite games at high FPS. We’ll provide specific recommendations for various budget ranges, including:

1. Esports and Just Chatting PC
2. AAA Starter Kit PC
3. High-End Combo Streamer
4. Beast Mode Machine

What’s More Important, the CPU or GPU?

For streaming PCs, you need a balanced machine. While many gaming PC builds recommend spending 40–50% of your budget on the GPU, streaming requires more CPU power to run OBS, Discord, Spotify, and other software simultaneously. A powerful CPU will also aid in editing your VODs and creating other content.

Intel vs. AMD vs. NVIDIA

Intel and AMD manufacture CPUs, while AMD, Intel, and NVIDIA make GPUs. Currently, Intel CPUs are hard to beat in terms of price and performance for productivity applications like Premiere Pro and OBS. They are also competitive in gaming benchmarks with AMD. However, Intel’s LGA 1700 socket will soon become obsolete, whereas AMD’s AM5 socket is just beginning its lifecycle, offering a better upgrade path.

For GPUs, AMD is budget-friendly for gaming, but NVIDIA’s NVENC encoder is superior for streaming, making an Intel CPU and NVIDIA GPU combo ideal for streamers.

1. The Esports/Just Chatting Streamer — ~$400–500
   - CPU: i5–12600K — https://amzn.to/3Wra1tE
   - GPU: RTX 4060 8GB — https://amzn.to/3SgeRqZ

— Alternate GPU Options —
- 3060 12GB — https://amzn.to/3Wt6jQ6
- 3070 8GB — https://amzn.to/4d4Xxgx
- 2080 Ti 11GB — https://amzn.to/3zKSu6B

2. The AAA Starter Kit — ~$700-$800
- CPU: i7–12700k — https://amzn.to/3YdnUgb
- GPU: GPU: RTX 4070 — https://amzn.to/4d3OBbe

— Alternate GPU Options —
- 4070 Super 12GB — https://amzn.to/3LxmpSo
- 3080 10GB — https://amzn.to/4d6M9AT
- 7800XT 16GB -https://amzn.to/3LriI0K
- 7900 GRE 16GB — https://amzn.to/3y3rsaa

3. High-End Combo — ~$1000–1200
- CPU: i7–14700k — https://amzn.to/3LPPNUp
- GPU: RTX 4070 Ti Super 16GB — https://amzn.to/3Y9uh4j

— Alternate GPU Options —
- 3090 24GB — https://amzn.to/4f8WXjI
- RX 7900 XT 20GB — https://amzn.to/4fd4COf

4. 🔥Top Tier, Beast Mode Machine🔥 — ~$1500–2300
- CPU: i9–14900k — https://amzn.to/3WtvsKw
- GPU: 4080 Super — 16GB — https://amzn.to/4cD5dXH

— Alternate GPU Options —
- 4090 24GB — https://amzn.to/4cP1Blu

Conclusion

Choosing the right CPU and GPU combo is critical for a smooth streaming experience. Ensure that the rest of your PC components, like the power supply, RAM, motherboard, and cooling system, are up to par with your chosen combo. If you’re interested in seeing a full build video of one of these combos, leave a comment, and I’ll do my best to create it.