AMD has officially confirmed that driver support will continue for older Radeon graphics cards featuring the RDNA 1 “RX 5000” and RDNA 2 “RX 6000” architectures. This announcement comes after the confusion caused by the latest Adrenalin driver and has reassured owners of older cards.

Support for older Radeon graphics cards will not be discontinued: AMD announces its plans

The last few days have been challenging for the AMD Radeon team due to the Adrenalin 25.10.2 driver release. This release has caused confusion due to communication issues with users. The driver notes stated that RDNA 1 (RX 5000) and RDNA 2 (RX 6000) series cards will be placed in “Maintenance Mode” and moved to a separate branch. This update also included other issues, such as the removal of USB-C charging support from the RX 7900 series (a decision later reversed) and package sizes exceeding 1GB. However, the biggest concern was driver support.

Initially, AMD stated in statements to technology publications that it would not discontinue game driver support and optimizations for older GPUs. It stated that support would be offered “based on market needs.” However, this statement failed to fully resolve the confusion because the phrase “market needs” was unclear.

AMD has now clarified the situation with a new and clear statement. The company announced that RDNA 1 “RX 5000” and RDNA 2 “RX 6000” GPUs will continue to receive driver support for the latest games. This support will include stability and game optimizations, as well as security and bug fixes. This approach will be similar to the support offered for the latest RDNA 3 “RX 7000” and RDNA 4 “RX 9000” GPUs.

The main change is in the driver development methodology. AMD stated that older GPUs will now benefit from a “custom and stable” driver branch. This branch is built upon years of tuning and game optimizations. This approach will ensure that older GPUs maintain stability and optimizations for current and future games. The new driver branch will help engineers deliver new features faster for the new GPU families (RDNA 3 and RDNA 4).

This news promises long-term game support and optimizations for all RDNA GPU families, including RDNA 1 and RDNA 2. It will be interesting to see how AMD delivers on this promise in future releases. So, what are your thoughts on AMD’s new driver strategy?