Clock drops accelerate above 85 degrees Celsius
GPUs reduce their clock speed automatically when temperature climbs to protect the chip from heat damage. At 75C, there is no throttling. At 85C, throttling begins, cutting clock speed by 5-10%. By 95C, the GPU might run at 70% of its rated speed. Long gameplay sessions that sustain high temperatures see this curve constantly, reducing effective performance far below the card's peak.
Sustained loads reveal the curve
A GPU benchmark that runs for 10 seconds might not thermally throttle at all because heat has not accumulated. A 4-hour gaming session generates sustained heat, and the throttling curve kicks in around hour two. This is why some cards handle short, intense workloads but struggle in endurance tests. Better cooling, undervolting, or thermal paste replacement can shift the curve down by 10-20 degrees.