Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti vs RTX 3070: Which one should you buy for midrange gaming?

The Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti was launched on April 15, 2025, as the latest midrange GPU for the PC gaming market. It is expected to bring higher performance than its predecessor, the RTX 4060 Ti.

The new GPU also has support for DLSS 4 Multi-Frame Gen (MFG) technology, which can quadruple the framerates in supported titles. Traditionally, 60 and 70-class graphics cards are known for their fantastic price-to-performance ratio, which makes us wonder how the 5060 Ti compares to the RTX 3070.

Well, let's compare the two GPUs and find out which delivers the best price-to-performance ratio.

Note: Some aspects of this article are subjective and solely reflect the writer's opinions.

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Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti vs RTX 3070

EVGA RTX 3070 FTW3 Ultra (Image via EVGA)

The RTX 5060 Ti is based on the new Blackwell architecture, while the older RTX 3070 is built on the aging Ampere architecture. Can the former GPU with newer Blackwell architecture beat the previous price-to-performance champion, RTX 3070? Let's find out.

Specs comparison

Here are the specs of the Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti vs RTX 3070:

Specifications	Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti	Nvidia RTX 3070
Architecture	Blackwell	Ampere
Shader cores	4608	5888
RT cores	36	46
TMUs	142	184
ROPs	48	96
Base core clock speeds	2407 MHz	1500 MHz
Boost core clock speeds	2572 MHz	1725 MHz
Memory capacity	8/16 GB	8 GB
Memory bus width	128-bit	256-bit
Memory bandwidth	488 GB/s	448 GB/s
Manufacturing node	5nm	8nm
Thermal design power (TDPs)	180W	220W

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Performance comparison

At first glance, the RTX 3070 seems to be the better GPU since it has higher shader cores, Texture Mapping Units (TMUs), and Raster Operation Pipelines (ROPs). However, the RTX 5060 Ti is built on the modern Blackwell architecture, which has several improvements over the older Ampere architecture.

Furthermore, it has significantly higher base and boost clock speeds. It also boasts slightly higher memory bandwidth and is built on a more advanced 5nm node. Therefore, the new RTX GPU matches or even beats the aging RTX 3070. The following table represents the performance gap between the two GPUs.

Games	Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti	Nvidia RTX 3070
Ghost of Tsushima (1080p, Ultra)	102 fps	83 fps
Cyberpunk 2077 (1080p, RTX On)	51 fps	49 fps
Black Myth Wukong	4 fps	4 fps
Monster Hunter Wilds	70 fps	63 fps
Assassin's Creed Mirage	124 fps	116 fps

After all, the RTX 5060 Ti will be faster than its predecessor, the RTX 4060 Ti, which was already quite close to the performance of the RTX 3070. Therefore, the 5060 Ti should close the gap and beat the RTX 3070 once and for all.

Besides, the RTX 5060 Ti's DLSS 4 MFG can also quadruple the framerates in supported games, which will lead to smoother visuals.

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Price comparison

MSI RTX 50 series GPU (Image via MSI)

The RTX 5060 Ti costs $379 for the 8GB model, while the 16GB model costs $429. On the other hand, the RTX 3070 currently costs around $550 to $600, which completely destroyed its previous price-to-performance status.

Not only the 8GB, but also the 16GB variant of the 5060 Ti is cheaper than the RTX 3070, which only has 8GB of memory.

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Final thoughts on Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti vs RTX 3070

The Nvidia RTX 5060 Ti will either match the RTX 3070 or beat it, depending on the games. If you utilize the DLSS 4 MFG technology, the former GPU will deliver about 3-4 times more performance than the latter. The 5060 Ti is also cheaper in both its 8GB and 16GB variants.

Therefore, it's the better GPU choice out of the two.