AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT vs. Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti: Which is better for gaming?

The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is the latest 1440p gaming graphics card from Team Red. Powered by the new and more efficient RDNA 3 technology, this GPU replaces the last-gen RX 6700 XT with more VRAM and better performance. AMD plans to replace the RTX 4060 Ti with this graphics card, which was primarily launched to target 1080p gaming.

Nvidia cards are generally known for their reliable performance in different resolutions. Moreover, the mid-range RTX 40 series cards are known for their slight performance improvements over the last-gen GPUs, making the RTX 30 series alternatives a good point for comparison.

In this article, we will compare the RX 7700 XT and the RTX 3060 Ti, the last-gen alternative to the 4060 Ti. It is expected that the 7700 XT will be faster than the 60-class GPU from the last generation. However, we are interested in the performance delta.

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The AMD RX 7700 XT packs way more power than the RTX 3060 Ti

Specs

The new 7700 XT is a mid-range 1440p gaming graphics card that is based on a completely different architecture from the last-gen RTX 3060 Ti. Therefore, it is very difficult to compare the on-paper specs of the two GPUs against each other.

However, a brief overview of the specs of the graphics cards is as follows:

	AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT	Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti
Graphics processor	Navi 32	GA104
Shading units/CUDA cores	3456	4864
TMUs	216	152
ROPs	96	80
Compute Units	54	N/A
Tensor cores	N/A	152
RT cores	54	38
Base clock	1700 MHz	1410 MHz
Boost clock	2544 MHz	1665 MHz
Memory size	12 GB GDDR6	8 GB GDDR6
TDP	245W	200W
Price	$450	$399

One of the pros of the RX 7700 XT over the last-gen RTX 3060 Ti is a larger 12 GB VRAM buffer. However, the GPU draws more power as compared to the 3060 Ti. Moreover, the 7700 XT is also costlier than the Nvidia GPU. This is in addition to the fact that the 3060 Ti is available for even cheaper in the used market.

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Performance difference

The new AMD RX 7700 XT is way more powerful as compared to the last-gen RTX 3060 Ti graphics card. At higher resolutions like 1440p and 4K, the new Team Red graphics card gets a massive advantage thanks to its considerably larger 12 GB memory buffer. 8 GB is already falling short for gaming and the RTX 3060 Ti faces the brunt of this problem with weaker performance capabilities.

YouTuber Mark PC compared the two graphics cards, running some video game benchmarks on both of them. The observed framerates are as follows:

	AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT	Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti
Assassin's Creed Valhalla	80	62
Watch Dogs Legion	79	61
Cyberpunk 2077	87	77
Doom Eternal	181	164
Red Dead Redemption 2	124	102

The RTX 3060 Ti is about 25-30% slower than the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT in almost every video game at 1440p. This is primarily because of the improved hardware powering the new Team Red graphics card and the extra VRAM it has.

Therefore, unless you are cash strapped and don't have $450 to spend on a graphics card, don't opt for the last gen RTX 3060 Ti. One of the primary complaints with that GPU is the limited 8 GB VRAM buffer. 12 GB is the new sweet spot that the RX 7700 XT targets along with better rendering prowess. However, the GPU will cost you dearly.