GeForce GTX 560 vs GTX 660

Place in the ranking	437	544
Place by popularity	58	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	3.28	1.75
Power efficiency	5.16	3.32
Architecture	Kepler (2012−2018)	Fermi 2.0 (2010−2014)
GPU code name	GK106	GF114
Market segment	Desktop	Desktop
Release date	6 September 2012 (12 years ago)	17 May 2011 (13 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	$229	$199

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

GTX 660 has 87% better value for money than GTX 560.

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 cores	960	336
Core clock speed	980 MHz	810 MHz
Boost clock speed	1033 MHz	no data
Number of transistors	2,540 million	1,950 million
Manufacturing process technology	28 nm	40 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	140 Watt	150 Watt
Maximum GPU temperature	no data	99 °C
Texture fill rate	82.56	45.36
Floating-point processing power	1.981 TFLOPS	1.089 TFLOPS
ROPs	24	32
TMUs	80	56

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).

Bus support	PCI Express 3.0	16x PCI-E 2.0
Interface	PCIe 3.0 x16	PCIe 2.0 x16
Length	241 mm	210 mm
Height	4.376" (11.1 cm)	4.376" (11.1 cm)
Width	2-slot	2-slot
Supplementary power connectors	1x 6-pin	2x 6-pin
SLI options	+	+

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 type	GDDR5	GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount	2 GB	1 GB
Memory bus width	192-bit GDDR5	256 Bit
Memory clock speed	6.0 GB/s	1000 MHz
Memory bandwidth	144.2 GB/s	128.0 GB/s

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 Connectors	One Dual Link DVI-I, One Dual Link DVI-D, One HDMI, One DisplayPort	Two Dual Link DVI, Mini HDMI
Multi monitor support	4 displays	+
HDMI	+	+
HDCP	+	+
Maximum VGA resolution	2048x1536	2048x1536
Audio input for HDMI	Internal	Internal

Supported technologies

Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.

3D Blu-Ray	+	+
3D Gaming	+	+
3D Vision	+	-

API compatibility

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

DirectX	12 (11_0)	12 (11_0)
Shader Model	5.1	5.1
OpenGL	4.3	4.1
OpenCL	1.2	1.1
Vulkan	1.1.126	N/A
CUDA	+	+

Synthetic benchmark performance

Non-gaming benchmark results comparison. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.

Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark score. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

GTX 660 10.37
+45.2%

GTX 560 7.14

Passmark

This is the most ubiquitous GPU benchmark. It gives the graphics card a thorough evaluation under various types of load, providing four separate benchmarks for Direct3D versions 9, 10, 11 and 12 (the last being done in 4K resolution if possible), and few more tests engaging DirectCompute capabilities.

GTX 660 4000
+45.2%

GTX 560 2755

3DMark Fire Strike Graphics

Fire Strike is a DirectX 11 benchmark for gaming PCs. It features two separate tests displaying a fight between a humanoid and a fiery creature made of lava. Using 1920x1080 resolution, Fire Strike shows off some realistic graphics and is quite taxing on hardware.

GTX 660 5040
+66.3%

GTX 560 3030

GeekBench 5 OpenCL

Geekbench 5 is a widespread graphics card benchmark combined from 11 different test scenarios. All these scenarios rely on direct usage of GPU's processing power, no 3D rendering is involved. This variation uses OpenCL API by Khronos Group.

GTX 660 11374
+24.9%

GTX 560 9103

Octane Render OctaneBench

This is a special benchmark measuring graphics card performance in OctaneRender, which is a realistic GPU rendering engine by OTOY Inc., available either as a standalone program, or as a plugin for 3DS Max, Cinema 4D and many other apps. It renders four different static scenes, then compares render times with a reference GPU which is currently GeForce GTX 980. This benchmark has nothing to do with gaming and is aimed at professional 3D graphics artists.

GTX 660 33
+6.5%

GTX 560 31

Gaming performance

Let's see how good the compared graphics cards are for gaming. Particular gaming benchmark results are measured in FPS.

Average FPS across all PC games

Here are the average frames per second in a large set of popular games across different resolutions:

Full HD

47
+56.7%

30−35

−56.7%

Cost per frame, $

1080p

4.87

6.63

Pros & cons summary

Performance score	10.37	7.14
Recency	6 September 2012	17 May 2011
Maximum RAM amount	2 GB	1 GB
Chip lithography	28 nm	40 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	140 Watt	150 Watt

GTX 660 has a 45.2% higher aggregate performance score, an age advantage of 1 year, a 100% higher maximum VRAM amount, a 42.9% more advanced lithography process, and 7.1% lower power consumption.

The GeForce GTX 660 is our recommended choice as it beats the GeForce GTX 560 in performance tests.

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