GeForce RTX 3050 vs GTX 1660
VS
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050
GA106
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1660
TU116
We compared two discrete desktop gaming GPUs: the GeForce RTX 3050 8 GB with 20 pipelines and 2560 shaders against the 2 years and 11 months older GTX 1660 6 GB that utilizes 22 pipelines and 1408 shaders. Here you will find complete details about specs, efficiency, performance tests, and more.
Review
Gaming
Performance in DirectX, OpenCL, and Vulkan games
Workstation
Perf. in 3D modeling, video editing and rendering apps
AI/ML
Capabilities for machine learning and AI-related tasks
Energy Efficiency
Power consumption efficiency in different scenarios
NanoReview Final Score
Overall video card score
Value for money (Beta)
Key differences
Reasons to consider the GeForce RTX 3050
- Performs better (up to 24%) in 3DMark Steel Nomad Lite
- 82% higher maximum theoretical performance (9.1 vs 5 TFLOPS)
- Manufactured using a more efficient 8 nm process technology
- Shows 20% higher average frame rate in modern games at QHD resolution – 42 vs 35 FPS
- Ray-tracing support with 20 dedicated RT cores
Gaming Performance
Frame rate comparison across popular AAA titles at different resolutionsGames
| Forza Horizon 5 | 92 53 43 26 |
81 45 36 24 |
| The Witcher 3 | 90 70 49 24 |
74 59 41 21 |
| Counter-Strike 2 | 139 101 72 31 |
119 83 60 25 |
| Far Cry 6 | 76 66 49 25 |
66 56 44 21 |
| Hogwarts Legacy | 49 38 30 13 |
42 32 23 12 |
| CoD: Modern Warfare III | 59 49 35 22 |
51 42 26 17 |
| Ghost of Tsushima | 46 35 28 15 |
37 30 20 11 |
| Cyberpunk 2077 | 48 45 26 11 |
40 36 22 9 |
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider | 80 73 49 25 |
68 62 43 20 |
| 1080p High | 75 | 64 |
| 1080p Ultra | 59 | 49 |
| 1440p Ultra | 42 | 35 |
| 4K Ultra | 21 | 18 |
| Margin of Error | Low | Low |
Benchmarks
Graphics cards’ performance in recent benchmarking apps3D Mark
Steel Nomad Lite Score
| Time Spy | 6235 | 5443 |
| Solar Bay | 30191 | 18104 |
| Port Royal | 3546 | 1455 |
| Fire Strike | 15967 | 14207 |
| Wild Life Extreme | 12795 | 10947 |
| Night Raid | 74854 | 66328 |
GeekBench 6 OpenCL
GB6 Compute Score
| Background Blur | 110.4 img/sec | 107.7 img/sec |
| Face Detection | 64.4 img/sec | 58.6 img/sec |
| Horizon Detection | 2.87 Gpixels/sec | 2.07 Gpixels/sec |
| Edge Detection | 3.76 Gpixels/sec | 2.61 Gpixels/sec |
| Gaussian Blur | 2.89 Gpixels/sec | 3 Gpixels/sec |
| Feature Matching | 0.81 Gpixels/sec | 0.77 Gpixels/sec |
| Stereo Matching | 270.9 Gpixels/sec | 301.7 Gpixels/sec |
| Particle Physics | 9339.7 FPS | 8078.5 FPS |
| API | OpenCL | OpenCL |
Cinebench 2024 GPU
Cinebench 2024 GPU
Passmark Graphics
G3D Mark Score
| G2D Mark | 916 | 777 |
| DirectX 11 | 90 FPS | 79 FPS |
| DirectX 12 | 59 FPS | 49 FPS |
| GPU Compute | 6415 Ops/s | 4928 Ops/s |
Blender
Blender GPU
Recent User Tests
GeForce RTX 3050
| Date | Benchmark | Result |
|---|---|---|
| 📘 2026-04-21 -> DmitryDmitry | Cinebench 2024 | 4722 |
| 📘 2026-04-21 -> DmitryDmitry | Steel Nomad Light | 6237 |
GeForce GTX 1660
No benchmark results yet
Artificial Intelligence Tests
Performance in machine learning and artificial intelligence tasksGeekBench 6 ML
GB6 ML Single Precision
GB6 ML Half Precision
GB6 ML Quantized
| Image Classification (SP) | 4958 | 3814 |
| Image Segmentation (HP) | 12747 | 4931 |
| Image Super Resolution (Q) | 9816 | 8081 |
| Face Detection (HP) | 22467 | 8691 |
| Pose Estimation (Q) | 41362 | 33497 |
| Text Classification (SP) | 2563 | 1586 |
| Machine Translation (HP) | 3721 | 2227 |
| Object Detection (SP) | 5929 | 4384 |
| Depth Estimation (Q) | 18361 | 16173 |
| Style Transfer (SP) | 84665 | 72011 |
| Framework | ONNX | ONNX |
| Backend | DirectML | DirectML |
Specifications
Technical specifications of GeForce RTX 3050 and GTX 1660General
| Vendor | Nvidia | Nvidia |
| Build | Discrete | Discrete |
| Released | January 27, 2022 | March 14, 2019 |
| Launch price (MSRP) | $249 | $219 |
| Case | Desktop | Desktop |
| Purpose | Gaming | Gaming |
| Segment | Entry-level | Entry-level |
| Architecture | Ampere | Turing |
| GPU Codename | GA106 | TU116 |
| Rival Equivalent | - | - Radeon RX 5600 XT |
| Recommended CPU | - Intel Core i5 12400 or above | - Intel Core i5 9500 or above |
Desktop GPU rating (71st and 78th place)
Graphics Processing Unit
| Base Clock | 1552 MHz | 1530 MHz |
| Boost Clock | 1777 MHz | 1785 MHz |
| Shading Units | 2560 | 1408 |
| Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) | 80 | 88 |
| Render Output Units (ROPs) | 32 | 48 |
| Compute Units (Pipelines) | 20 | 22 |
| Tensor Cores | 80 | No |
| Ray-tracing Cores | 20 | No |
| L1 Cache | 128KB per cluster | 64KB per cluster |
| L2 Cache | 2MB shared | 1536KB shared |
| Instructions Per Cycle | 2 IPC | 2 IPC |
Raw Performance
| Pixel Fill Rate | 57 GPixel/s | 86 GPixel/s |
| Texture Fill Rate | 142 GTexel/s | 157 GTexel/s |
FLOPS (FP32)
Physical
| Interface | PCIe 4.0 x8 | PCIe 3.0 x16 |
| TGP | 130 W | 120 W |
| Manufacturing | Samsung | TSMC |
| Fabrication Process | 8 nm | 12 nm |
| Die Size | 276 mm² | 284 mm² |
| Transistor Count | 12 billion | 6 billion |
| Transistor Density | 43.48 MTr/mm² | 21.13 MTr/mm² |
Memory
| Memory Type | GDDR6 | GDDR5 |
| Memory Size | 8 GB | 6 GB |
| Memory Clock | 1750 MHz | 2001 MHz |
| Effective Memory Speed | 14000 Mbps | 8000 Mbps |
| Bus | 128-bit | 192-bit |
| ECC | No | No |
Memory Bandwidth
API
| DirectX | 12 | 12 |
| Vulkan | 1.3 | 1.3 |
| OpenGL | 4.6 | 4.6 |
| OpenCL | 3.0 | 3.0 |
| CUDA | 8.6 | 7.5 |
| Ray Tracing | Yes | No |
| DLSS | DLSS 2 | No |
| DisplayPort | 1.4a | 1.4a |
Cast your vote
Total votes: 45