GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q vs GTX 1660

Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the ranking186not rated
Place by popularity39not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation48.17no data
Power efficiency17.30no data
ArchitectureTuring (2018−2022)Ampere (2020−2024)
GPU code nameTU116GA106
Market segmentDesktopLaptop
Release date14 March 2019 (5 years ago)12 January 2021 (3 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)$219 no data

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

no data

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores14083840
Core clock speed1530 MHz817 MHz
Boost clock speed1785 MHz1282 MHz
Number of transistors6,600 million13,250 million
Manufacturing process technology12 nm8 nm
Power consumption (TDP)120 Watt60 Watt
Texture fill rate157.1153.8
Floating-point processing power5.027 TFLOPS9.846 TFLOPS
ROPs4848
TMUs88120
Tensor Coresno data120
Ray Tracing Coresno data30

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

Laptop sizeno datalarge
InterfacePCIe 3.0 x16PCIe 4.0 x16
Length229 mmno data
Width2-slotno data
Supplementary power connectors1x 8-pinNone

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory typeGDDR5GDDR6
Maximum RAM amount6 GB6 GB
Memory bus width192 Bit192 Bit
Memory clock speed2001 MHz1500 MHz
Memory bandwidth192.1 GB/s288.0 GB/s
Shared memory--

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 1x DisplayPortNo outputs
HDMI+-

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX12 (12_1)12 Ultimate (12_2)
Shader Model6.56.5
OpenGL4.64.6
OpenCL1.22.0
Vulkan1.2.1311.2
CUDA7.58.6

Pros & cons summary


Recency 14 March 2019 12 January 2021
Chip lithography 12 nm 8 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 120 Watt 60 Watt

RTX 3060 Max-Q has an age advantage of 1 year, a 50% more advanced lithography process, and 100% lower power consumption.

We couldn't decide between GeForce GTX 1660 and GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q. We've got no test results to judge.

Be aware that GeForce GTX 1660 is a desktop card while GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q is a notebook one.


Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

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NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660
GeForce GTX 1660
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q
GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q

Comparisons with similar GPUs

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Community ratings

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4.1 5334 votes

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3.5 185 votes

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Questions & comments

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