Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti launch looks imminent — and AMD should be worried

Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti leaked image
(Image credit: Videocardz)

It’s looking very likely that the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is on its way, and could arrive in early December, thanks to leaked images showing off the graphics card in the flesh (or, the metal and silicon). 

Coming courtesy of Videocardz, a pair of leaked images show what appears to be Nvidia’s own version of the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti,  rather than those of graphics card partners. This "Founders Edition" card looks very similar to the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 Founders Edition, with a few minor changes. 

While that might seem a little bit boring, keeping the same design that runs through the rest of the GeForce RTX 3000-series is good news, as it means the RTX 3060 Ti will sport the same cooling potential as its more powerful siblings. That means a dual-fan design with one fan taking in air, and the other exhausting it, as well as a bountiful amount of heat sinks. 

If the leaked images are legitimate, then we can probably expect to see one HDMI 2.1 and a trio of DisplayPort 1.4 ports, in keeping with those of the RTX 3070. 

While the design of the RTX 3080 Ti might not set the pulses of gaming PC builders racing, the performance of the GPU might. It’s expected to use a throttled version of the RTX 3070 GPU, but still deliver performance that can beat the very powerful RTX 2080 Super from the previous generation of GeForce graphics cards.

With a price tag that’s expected to be around the $400 mark, the RTX 3060 Ti could offer a lot of graphical grunt for its cost.

That would make it one of the best mainstream graphics cards for gaming around 1440p with max settings enabled and ray tracing. And it could have that segment of the graphics cards arena to itself, as AMD’s latest Radeon RX 6000 series doesn't have a $400 card. The cheapest RDNA 2 Radeon graphics card is the $549 Radeon RX 6800, which promises strong performance at 1440p and 4K resolution, but it's perhaps too expensive for mid-range PC gaming.

With the rumors pointing toward the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti getting revealed on December 2, we’ve not got long to wait before we see what Nvidia will do next with its new Ampere-based GeForce range.

Roland Moore-Colyer

Roland Moore-Colyer a Managing Editor at Tom’s Guide with a focus on news, features and opinion articles. He often writes about gaming, phones, laptops and other bits of hardware; he’s also got an interest in cars. When not at his desk Roland can be found wandering around London, often with a look of curiosity on his face.