We might think that NVIDIA has made slight changes to these two graphics cards, since they belong to the same series and are very close in performance and price, but the reality is that there is more fabric to cut under the hood than it seems in a beginning. Why? Let’s see.

NVIDIA RTX 3060 vs RTX 3060 Ti

Although the aesthetic section is completely confusing because apparently we are facing the same model, do not be fooled by anything, it is just a pure facade. The reality is that they only share PCB and heatsink, because the rest is totally different and this is precisely what matters.

We will start by talking about its chips, its die, the GPU itself, where the smaller of the two sisters integrates a GA106-300-A1 . This would not be more relevant if it were not for the fact that the RTX 3060 Ti integrates a GA104-200-A1 , a superior chip that although cut for the occasion is the same as the one used by the RTX 3070 and RTX 3070 Ti.

Therefore, starting there are two different performances and with a slight GAP between them. Likewise, both belong to the Ampere range and are manufactured in Samsung‘s 8 nm, but the number of transistors and the area are completely different due to what is mentioned above. The smallest achieves 13,250 million transistors and an area of 276 mm2 , the largest has 17,400 million transistors and 392 mm2 , so proportionally and thermally they should be on par for the same heatsink, but we will have to check the consumption to discern it, as well as frequencies.

Likewise, both graphics cards have support for PCIe 4.0 x16 and lower, so they have the same bandwidth available. This seems obvious but it is not, because in certain models they are cut to x8, especially low and mid-range, although this is not the case here.

GA104 vs GA106

What do each of the chips make up? Well, there are quite a few differences between them, starting with the RTX 3060 and its 3584 Shaders that are distributed in 28 SM at a rate of 128 Shaders for each of them (actually there are 64, but NVIDIA doubles the amount because it considers the double FP32s). His sister gets 4864 Shaders spread over 38 SM , so for simple CUDA units there is already a clear winner, although not everything is said far from it.

The first is accompanied by 112 TMU, 48 ROP, 112 Tensor Core and 28 RT Cores , the second instead sees the numbers increased to 152 TMU, 80 ROP, 152 Tensor Cores and 38 RT Cores . What they do logically share is the 128 KB of L1 for each SM that they integrate, so the greater the number of them, the greater the first-level cache.

This also occurs in the L2 cache, where the RTX 3060 obtains 3MB while Ti RTX 3060 goes up to 4 MB.

Same type of memory, different buses and speeds

Looking at the chips in full, we need a clear picture of what the VRAM memory is going to offer in order to accurately deliver a verdict on FP32, because the type, speed, bus and frequencies of the chips determine almost everything.

The muscle is accompanied by frequencies that for the GA106 are 1,320 MHz in base and 1,777 MHz in Boost, while the higher of the two obtains 1,410 MHz in base and 1,665 MHz in Boost, figures in both cases that will increase according to the quality of the ASIC and the dissipation of the heatsink on duty, where in the case of being Founders Edition they are surely very equal in said rise.

What they do share is undoubtedly their VRAM, although there are also differences. Both graphics cards pack GDDR6 under their belt, but the smaller one gets curiously more VRAM ( 12GB ) while the larger, more powerful one settles for 8GB . Another difference in this regard is that the RTX 3060 has real memories at 1,875 MHz or 15 Gbps effective, while its faster sister conforms to 1,750 real MHz or 14 Gbps effective, where curiously it beats it in bandwidth.

Why? Well, for a simple reason, the RTX 3060 Ti has a 256-bit bandwidth, which gives it 448 GB / s for the 360 GB / s of the RTX 3060 due to the 192 bits it integrates.

Power, consumption and dimensions

Starting from the base that being the same series they support the same technologies such as DX12 Ultimate, OpenGL 4.6, OpenCL 3.0, Vulkan 1.2, CUDA 8.6 and Shader Model 6.6, having seen all the above we have interesting differences in consumption.

For the 242 x 112 mm that both cards measure with their heatsinks, the RTX 3060 consumes 170 watts for the 200 of its older sister, which does not change that both need a 12-pin connector from NVIDIA (Founders Edition) or one of 8 pins if we have a custom model. Anyway, they both have one HDMI 2.1 and three DisplayPort 2.0b.

Mind you, watch out for the water blocks because the PCBs are marked differently by NVIDIA: PG190 SKU 60 for the minor and PG142 SKU 20 for the RTX 3060 Ti. That said, the result if we take into account the previous data and always speaking of gross power that is not effective, gives us the result in FP32 in floating point of 12.74 TFLOPS for the RTX 3060 and 16.20 TFLOPS for the RTX 3060 Ti. .

Having seen all this, we can only compare the prices. The NVIDIA RTX 3060 has an MSRP price of $ 329 , while the RTX 3060 Ti goes all the way to $ 399 .

Conclusion: RTX 3060 vs RTX 3060 Ti

Is it worth paying more? Well, in this case yes, because despite having 4 GB less VRAM, the performance shoots up between 22% and 26% approximately in favor of Ti, so the price GAP is more than justified as long as we do not play at 4K resolutions in Ultra, where the 12 GB of the RTX 3060 would reduce the distance at some point, although not too much due to its lower global bandwidth.