Nvidia ostensibly brought back the RTX 3060 12GB in late June to help gamers cope with the ongoing component crisis. Since most of the world's memory is being routed to expensive AI chips, the RTX 3060 12GB offered gamers a 12GB VRAM pool for what was supposed to be a reasonable price... if only the price remained steady. As of today, this five-year-old GPU now costs almost $500 across the world, which is just as much as the RTX 5060.
MSI's Ventus 2X OC variant of the RTX 3060 12GB launched at just $300 on its online store and $340 on Newegg. It's now listed for $480 in both places. That's a 60% increase in less than two months, compared to its lowest price. Similarly, Asus' Dual V2 OC variant was released with a $330 MSRP, which quickly rose to $360 on Newegg, and the same card is now sitting at $500, constituting a 52% price hike from launch.
The cheapest RTX 3060 12GB right now, the Gigabyte Windforce OC Rev 2.0 model, currently costs $460, up 35% from the $340 it arrived at in late June. The same GPU is listed for 417 GBP on Amazon UK, which converts to $566. In Europe, the cheapest variant is once again Asus' Dual V2 OC, costing 386 EUR on Amazon Germany, or roughly $450; price aggregator Geizhals says it was just 330 EUR a month ago.
In comparison, the RTX 5060, which is two generations newer, can be easily had for around $450 from a bunch of different vendors. That GPU is not only significantly faster but also more efficient, while carrying the latest features such as DLSS multi-frame gen support. In our GPU hierarchy, the 5060 is actually just as powerful as the RTX 3070 at 1080p and 1440p, and it carries the same amount of VRAM, 8GB.
That VRAM capacity is the only thing going for the 3060 12GB at this point, and even with extra memory to utilize, the GPU isn't really capable enough to deliver better performance in games. Plus, you can find better deals on the used market, or even renewed offers from big retailers, so the re-launched RTX 3060 12GB just doesn't make sense from any angle right now, despite its still-decent 1080p chops.
The 3060 is cheaper to produce for Nvidia, thanks to its slower GDDR6 memory compared to the GDDR7 you get on the 5060. It's fabricated on the older, less in-demand 8nm node from Samsung, compared to TSMC's N5, which should also help with yield. But none of those manufacturing leniencies seem to be trickling down to the customer. Even the RTX 5050, which can be had for $300, is faster than the revived RTX 3060 12GB.