Nvidia RTX 4060 vs RTX 3060 Ti comparison – which GPU should you go for?

MSI Gaming GeForce RTX 4060

Base Clock

1830MHz

Boost Clock

2460MHz

VRAM

8GB

Recommended PSU

300W

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We’re here to compare the RTX 4060 vs RTX 3060 Ti, so you can decide which one is right for you.

The RTX 4060 has launched, and its price might just be hitting the sweet spot. We reckon it will be one of the best GPUs for under $500 and it might just become the default pick for budget-conscious people who are after the Ada Lovelace architecture.

One card that is vying for that same budget friendly market is the RTX 3060 Ti. It too balances good FHD performance with a more reasonable price than many other cards in the Nvidia roster. It does have some impressive specs but is now older than, and a generation behind, the RTX 4060.

To help you figure out which one you want to go for, we’ve broken our comparison down into several different sections and compared the two GPUs in each. Let’s get into it.

RTX 4060 vs RTX 3060 Ti – specs

	RTX 4060 specs	RTX 3060 Ti specs
Architecture	Ada Lovelace	Ampere
CUDA Cores	3,072	3,584
Base Clock (MHz)	1,830	1,320
Boost Clock (MHz)	2,460	1,777
Memory	8GB GDDR6	12GB
Memory Bus	128-bit	192-bit
Memory bandwidth	272GB/s	360GB/s
Total graphics power	115W	170W

As you can see from the table, in general these cards look pretty much neck and neck in terms of hardware specs. The RTX 3060 Ti boasts a wider memory bus and thus a larger bandwidth, 260GB/s versus 272GB/s for the 4060. However, the RTX 4060 has a superior clock with both its boost and base speeds outperforming the 3060 Ti.

In two key areas, the 3060 Ti does have the edge. It has 4GB more VRAM with 12GB versus just 8GB for the RTX 4060. This is surely a dealbreaker for many. It also has around 500 more CUDA cores. This is one of the most important specs for evaluating performance as it’s these cores that do much of the brute work of executing the necessary calculations for rendering graphics. With a higher count, these calculations can be completed faster.

While it does not affect performance, it is worth noting that the RTX 3060 has a higher TDP. This not only means you will need a more expensive PSU to operate, it but will also drive up the cost of running it over time. Perhaps in raw performance, the difference between these two GPUs might not be massive. However, the 4060 has the advantage of DLSS 3 which provides a serious boost to performance through AI upscaling.

RTX 4060 vs RTX 3060 Ti – architecture

Architecture has a huge effect on the overall performance of a GPU. It is what facilitates all the different components to interact. The impact is so significant that whenever a new GPU architecture is released by Nvidia a whole new series of cards is announced with it.

The RTX 4060’s Lovelace architecture and the RTX 3060’s Amphere, are a generation apart from one another. This means that the RTX 4060 has 3rd generation ray tracing cores and 4th generation Tensor cores to the RTX 3060 Ti’s 2nd generation ray tracing cores and 3rd generation tensor cores. As a result, while both are very proficient at ray tracing and the AI calculations the Tensor cores are responsible for, the RTX 4060 performs better here.

It’s these newer Tensor cores that facilitate the incredible power of Lovelace’s DLSS 3 technology too. This can hugely boost performance when turned on in compatible games. The DLSS 2 in the RTX 3060 Ti is also impressive, but less so than its next generation equivalent.

RTX 4060 vs RTX 3060 Ti – performance

Now that we have covered the specs and architecture of both these graphics cards, let’s get into what this means for performance. We’ll start with the RTX 3060 Ti as we have precise benchmarks for the card. The 3060 Ti was one of the more popular cards of the Amphere range and its not hard to see why, for an impressive price it offers you frame rates around 150 at 1080p and even a respectable 1440p performance, and that is without DLSS 2 enabled.

We don’t yet have any precise numbers for the RTX 4060 so its exact performance is a bit more murky. Based on the RTX 4060 specs, however, we predict it will be one of the best GPUs for 1080p with frame rates suitable for competitive online play. With just 8GB for VRAM however, it is likely to struggle at higher resolutions, though this will be able to be mitigated against with DLSS 3. In games that are not compatible with the technology though, it’s very possible the card would fail to reach 60 fps consistently at 1440p, and almost certainly the case that the RTX 4060 won’t be good at 4K. Check out Gamers Nexus’ review and benchmarks for the full story.

RTX 4060 vs RTX 3060 Ti – price

Even though it has no direct impact on gaming performance, it’s fair to say that price is a pretty important factor for most people. While both of these cards are on the more affordable side of things, especially for Nvidia, they are by no means free. The RTX 3060 Ti launched with an MSRP of $399, and that price has largely remained the same since, though you can get it for less, and some of the best RTX 3060 TI AIBs are a bit more.

The RTX 4060 meanwhile has launched for $299, and it is likely that sellers will go above that depending on the exact specs of the version they release. Still, the RTX 3060 Ti will be the more expensive card overall.

Final word

We reckon the RTX 4060 will offer a slightly better price for performance than the RTX 3060 Ti. Not only that but as a newer bit of technology you will also be better proofed against the next wave of improvements made to gaming technology.

That said, the RTX 3060 Ti is a capable card and may well end up having slightly better 1440p performance than the RTX 4060, if you find an especially good deal or offer on one, it is certainly worth considering.