Nvidia’s upcoming entry-level GeForce RTX 3060 Ti could represent a terrific value for gamers on a budget when it launches. Though Nvidia has not released details about the card, early testing with 3DMark’s Time Spy and Fire Strike utilities show the oft-rumored RTX 3060 Ti beating the prior-generation RTX 2080 Super card. For reference, the RTX 2080 Super is a more premium card in Nvidia’s RTX 2000 series family that commanded a price of $699, while the RTX 3060 Ti’s rumored retail price is just $399.
The boost in performance of the RTX 3060 Ti and potentially competitive price on its rumored December 2 launch date show that Nvidia had made significant strides with the Ampere architecture. But we already knew this. The RTX 3070, flagship RTX 3080, and enthusiast-class RTX 3090 are some of the most powerful graphics cards ever.
In the 3DMark Fire Strike test, the RTX 3060 Ti’s performance slots in between that of the RTX 3070 and the prior generation RTX 2080 Super. The RTX 3060 Ti scored 30,706 points on this test, according to information posted by VideoCardz, compared to just 28,980 points on the RTX 2080 Super and 34,200 on the 3070.
Interestingly, the publication noted that performance of the RTX 3070 was approximately 11% better than the RTX 3060 Ti despite the more expensive card having just 1,024 more CUDA cores. The RTX 3070 was announced with 5,888 CUDA cores, 152 tensor cores, and 38 RT cores. It is rumored that the RTX 3060 Ti will launch with 4,864 CUDA cores, suggesting that its clock speed may be quite high to make up for the CUDA core shortfall. Custom versions could lead to its performance getting even closer to that of the 3070.
Performance using the 3DMark Time Spy test was very similar, and the leaked benchmark revealed that the RTX 3070 performed 13% better than the RTX 3060 Ti. Like with the 3DMark Fire Strike test, the RTX 3060 Ti’s performance comes in between that of the RTX 3070 and RTX 2080 Super. The RTX 3070 achieved 13,740 points in the Time Spy benchmark, compared to 12,175 points for the RTX 3060 Ti and 11,640 points for the the RTX 2080 Super.
For reference, the RTX 3080 scored 17,940 points on Time Spy, while the competing AMD Radeon RX 6800 scored 15,200 points on the same benchmark. The Radeon RX 6800 XT achieved a score of 17,400 points in Time Spy and 50,380 points in Fire Strike, while the 3080 scored 43,260 points in fire Strike.
Given the relatively inexpensive rumored price for the RTX 3060 Ti and Nvidia’s recent history of GPU shortages created by low inventory and strong demand, it’s likely that gamers interested in this entry-level card will have to pre-order early on launch day or check back frequently for when Nvidia replenishes inventory.
