NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060
Side-by-side benchmark comparison, specs, pricing, and value analysis.
Benchmark Comparison
Gaming figures are average frames per second, measured by Tom's Hardware GPU hierarchy. Geometric mean of 15 games, ultra settings, no upscaling. Ray tracing figures are DXR-enabled at 1440p. A dash means the card was not tested at that resolution. Productivity and Steel Nomad are synthetic scores on their own scales and are not comparable to the fps columns.
Specifications
| Spec | GeForce RTX 3060 | GeForce RTX 5060 |
|---|---|---|
| VRAM | 12GB GDDR6 | 8GB GDDR7 |
| Memory Bandwidth | 360 GB/s | 448 GB/s |
| Shaders | 3584 | 3840 |
| Boost Clock | 1777 MHz | 2497 MHz |
| TDP | 170W | 145W |
| Architecture | Ampere | Blackwell 2.0 |
| 3DMark Steel Nomad | 1,965 | 3,149 |
| Best Price | $250 | $299 |
| Value Score | 54/100 | 85/100 |
Verdict
The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 is the clear winner — it offers both better performance and better value.
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060: Which Should You Buy?
This is not a close race. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 delivers 76.3 fps at 1440p ultra to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060's 54 fps, a 41% gap. Only pick the slower card if it is dramatically cheaper or you need it for a lower resolution.
You pay a 20% premium for the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 ($299 against $250) to get 41% more frames. The extra performance more than covers the extra cost.
Two things beyond raw speed: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 carries 12GB against 8GB — the deciding factor at 1440p and above with ray tracing or texture packs, and the reason 8GB cards age badly; and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 is 4 years newer (2025 versus 2021), so it gets longer driver support and newer upscaling and frame generation features.