The Nvidia RTX 4060 could be the GPU to save PC gaming – unless this leak is true

Please be wrong, please be wrong…

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As we recently reported,Nvidia’s budget desktop GPUs are expected to landin the next couple of months, with the RTX 4060 rumored to be launching in May – and the RTX 4060 Ti and 4050 supposedly dropping around the same May-June window.

What we didn’t know at the time was that freshly leaked specs for the RTX 4060 and 4060 Ti had also surfaced, withVideoCardzreporting on that – as well as further corroborating the suggested May release date.

Those leaked specs have me pretty worried, though. My colleague John Loeffler alreadyraised concerns about the RTX 4060back in February, and I’m here to double down on those claims: the most recent rumors have all but confirmed that both the 4060andits big brother the 4060 Ti will only have 8GB of GDDR6 (not the GDDR6X found in the currently available RTX 4000 cards) with a 128-bit bus. That’s… not good.

Compared to theRTX 3060 Ti, that’s the same amount of video memory with literally half the bus width, and both of these cards have fewer shader cores too. Sure, it’s built on newer, faster architecture, so the baseline performance will be better, but the VRAM situation is concerning.

Analysis: 8GB is rapidly becoming insufficient for triple-A PC games

See, while 8GB of on-card video memory is fine in most instances, we’re seeing more and more games start to really guzzle that VRAM. As our good friends over atPCGamerpointed out, the recent PC port ofThe Last of Us: Part 1glugs down more than 8GB of memory – and that’s just at 1080p High. Crank up the resolution or graphical quality and you’re going to be looking at much worse.

Sure, TLOU’s PC port has been notoriously poorly optimized, but the reality here is that it’s a phenomenally popular game that you’d struggle to run well at 1080p without 12GB of VRAM. Plenty of recent games can chew up more than 8GB, especially at 1440p and4K.

Although we don’t have pricing for Nvidia’s next-gen budget GPUs yet, I’d expect the RTX 4060 Ti to land somewhere in the $300-500 range – a price comparable toAMD’s RX 6700 XT, which notablydoeshave 12GB of VRAM. I’m basing that price tag assumption on theRTX 3060 Ti’s list price, and thenewly-leaked pricing for the RTX 4070, incidentally.

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This could be a make-or-break moment for Nvidia

The RTX 4060 (and, to a lesser extent, the 4060 Ti) are the GPUs I’ve personally been waiting for. Yes, I know theRTX 4090’s performance is earth-shatteringly fast, but it’s theRTX 4070 Tithat sits at the top of ourbest graphics cardslist – and that’s because it’s better value for money.

The fact is that most gamers (and plenty of professional content creators) simply can’t afford to drop over $1,000 on a new GPU. I’m more interested in thebest cheap graphics cards- I used a trusty old Nvidia GTX 1060 for years, and it served me well. If we take a look at theSteam Hardware Survey, we can see that Nvidia’s xx60 cards account for four of the top five most-used GPUs among PC gamers.

It’s clear that these more affordable graphics cards are the ones gamers actually want (or at least, can reasonably afford to buy), so there’s a lot riding on the RTX 4060. I’m seriously worried that it’ll underperform – and Nvidia really needs at least one of its budget RTX 4000 lineup to offer excellent bang for your buck.

I hope this latest round of rumors is incorrect; or at least that Nvidia can make that 8GB of GDDR6 stretch farther than expected. The RTX 4060 needs to follow the 3060 and 2060 as the most-used desktop card of this new generation. Prove the naysayers wrong, Nvidia!

Christian is TechRadar’s UK-based Computing Editor. He came to us from Maximum PC magazine, where he fell in love with computer hardware and building PCs. He was a regular fixture amongst our freelance review team before making the jump to TechRadar, and can usually be found drooling over the latest high-end graphics card or gaming laptop before looking at his bank account balance and crying.

Christian is a keen campaigner for LGBTQ+ rights and the owner of a charming rescue dog named Lucy, having adopted her after he beat cancer in 2021. She keeps him fit and healthy through a combination of face-licking and long walks, and only occasionally barks at him to demand treats when he’s trying to work from home.

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