Nvidia gtx 970 vs 1060: What are the main differences?

The GTX 970 and the GTX 1060 are two cards that do not share many similar characteristics, because they belong to different market segments. Here you will discover the gtx 970 vs 1060. The former is aimed at higher-end gamers looking for a graphics card that offers good performance at high settings in every game out there; while the latter targets entry-level users who want to play demanding titles such as Crysis 3, Battlefield 4 and GTA V on high settings.

Nvidia gtx 970 vs 1060: Main differences

gtx 970 is equipped with 4GB of GDDR5 VRAM and a 256-bit interface, but only 2816 CUDA cores (vs. 960 on the GTX 1060) and a maximum video memory frequency of 7GHz (GDDR5 effective). The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 comes with 6GB of GDDR5 memory, has 1280 CUDA Cores, a 192-bit interface and a maximum VRAM frequency of 8GHz.

Technical Specifications

Graphics card GTX 980 GTX 1060 6 GB GTX 970 GPU 28nm GP104-400 16nm FF GP106-400 28nm GM204 CUDA Cores 2048 1280 1664 TMUs 128 80 104 ROPs 64 48 64 Base Clock (MHz) 1126 1505 1050 Boost Clock (MHz) 1216 1709 1178 Effective Memory Clock (MHz) 7000 8000 7000 Memory Bus 256-bit 192-bit 256-bit Video memory 4GB GDDR5 6GB GDDR5 4GB GDDR5 Memory Type / Size / Bandwidth 4096MB GDDR5 / 256-bit / 224 GB/s GDDR5 / 6144MB GDDR5 / 192-bit / 154.4 GB/s Power Connectors 2x 8-pin 1×6-pin 1×8-pin TDP 165W 120W 145W

Benchmarks

GTX 1080 GTX 980 Ti GTX 980 GTX 1060 3 GB Battlefield 1 (DX12) 87 fps 63 fps 51 fps 51 fps Crysis 3 (DX11) 66.2 fps 52.8 fps 43.5 fps 39.5 fps The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (DX11) 76.1 69.6 54 45

Performance

We can see that the GTX 1060 offers an overall increase of 38% compared to GTX 970. This is definitely a significant improvement, especially if you have a 1080P monitor. We are talking about fps gains here, so even if you have a 2560 x 1440 screen there will be noticeable improvements thanks to the extra VRAM.

Price and availability

It is important to highlight that GTX 970 was only on the market for about six months before it was replaced by GTX 980, and it has been almost a year and a half since its release. It can be found at $299 on Amazon while you can get the newer GTX 1060 6GB at $249.

Conclusion

gtx 970 vs 1060: What’s better for you? If you place an emphasis on high settings and 1080p/1440p resolutions, we still think that the GTX 1060 represents a better choice. The performances you can get out of the GTX 1060 and and i5-6600K processor work well together, as we have seen in many tests. On top of that, at $249 MSRP (overclocked models will be more expensive), it represents a great deal for gamers on a budget.