RTX 2060 Vs. RTX 2070, Which Should You Choose?

The graphics card is the most important component in any gamers arsenal. Regardless of budget, there comes a time when two GPU models, similarly matched, need to be compared, giving us a better idea of which is going to be best for our individual needs. Today we are looking at the two lower-end RTX GPUs from Nvidia and pitting them against each other, the RTX 2060 Vs. 2070.

We will be taking a close look at the specifications of each card to see the differences in performance in real-world scenarios, ultimately finding out if they are worth your money.

Specifications	RTX 2060	RTX 2070
GPU Name	TU106	TU106
GPU Architecture	Turing	Turing
CUDA Cores	1920	2304
RT Cores	30	36
Tensor Cores	240	288
Memory	6GB GDDR6	8GB GDDR6
Memory Interface	192-bit	256-bit
Memory Bandwidth	336 GB/s	448 GB/s
Bus Interface	PCI Express 3.0	PCI Express 3.0
DirectX	12	12
SLI	No	No
TDP	160W	185W

Nvidia’s RTX 2060 may be their entry-level Ray Tracing GPU but its beefy power does it justice in the benchmarking and features some of the best value for money in the series. The RTX 2060 sits just below the RTX 2070, offering similar levels of performance at a much more affordable price.

In this section, we are going to see what is behind the specifications of the RTX 2060 and RTX 2070. There may be a few gamers out there that are still slightly confused as to which GPU they should go for, so comparing features, architecture, and performance should clear that up.

Architecture And Features

Both the RTX 2060 and 2070 cards were built on the 12nm process and are based on the TU106. Nvidia’s TU106 GPUs use the Turing Architecture and both support DirectX 12 Ultimate. The Turing architecture across the series brings real-time ray tracing, AI, and programmable shading altogether.

The Turing Architecture, in both the RTX 2060 and 2070, combines multiple types of specialized processor cores, enabling the implementation of real-time ray tracing. The TU106 graphics processor chip features a die area of 445 mm² and 10,800 million transistors. The RTX 2060 differs from the fully unlocked RTX 2070, which uses the same processing unit but has all 2304 shaders enabled(CUDA cores), 144 texture mapping units, and 64 render output units. On the other hand, Nvidia has disabled some shading units on the RTX 2060, with it featuring 1920 shading units, 120 TMUs, and 48 ROPs.

Both the RTX 2060 and 2070 support OpenGL 4.5, Vulkan, Nvidia Ansel, GPU Boost, and G-Sync. Furthermore, both cards are VR ready and do a superb job with any VR title. Tensor Cores, which help improve the speed of machine learning applications only differ slightly between the two cards, with the RTX 2060 featuring 240 and the RTX 2070 288.

Despite the RTX 2070 being the more powerful card, the power consumption of the two is quite similar. The RTX 2060 has a TDP of 160W while the RTX 2070 has a TDP of 175W, meaning you could run both cards off a 500W PSU if needed.

Memory

While both the RTX 2060 and the RTX 2070 feature GDDR6 memory, the specifics vary. The GDDR6 memory across the series is produced by Samsung, with there being 6GB in the RTX 2060 and 8GB in the 2070. The RTX 2060 features a 192-bit interface, with a bandwidth of 336 Gb/s. The RTX 2070, however, features a 256-bit interface, with a bandwidth of 448 Gb/s. That extra 2GB we see in the RTX 2070 is only really noticeable when playing games at a higher resolution like 4K, or when performing other memory heavy tasks.

Price And Availability

There is a large price difference between the RTX 2060 Vs. The RTX 2070 and yet the performance is negligible until you reach higher resolutions than 1080p. Here we have two MSI Ventus GPUs, showing even after all this time there is still a significant difference in price.

No products found.

No products found.

As you can see, there is nearly a $100 difference in price between the RTX 2060 and 2070, making the 2060 a very attractive option. That being said, AMD’s Radeon 5700 XT offers better performance for the same price as the RTX 2070. With AMD’s 5700 XT you won’t be able to take advantage of the ray tracing technology but you will get a lot more for your buck.

It is still easy enough to get hold of an RTX 2060 but the RTX 2070 is quite scarce. Since Nvidia launched their Super range of these RTX beasts, they are no longer as readily available.

To give you a brief insight into the power of the RTX 2060 and 2070, we benchmarked the two GPUs across some commonly played titles. The test bench featured an Intel i7-8700K and 16GB of DDR4 RAM.

We ran the titles below in maxed graphics at a resolution of 1440p to truly test the two GPUs.

As you can see the RTX 2070 featured the better performance over the 2060 but that doesn’t mean as much when you consider the price difference. For anyone looking to play in QHD (1440p) and no sacrifice on settings, the RTX 2070 is the smarter choice. For the most intensive games in high quality, you may even have to opt for a 2070 Super and upwards to ensure you have the best experience. For 1080p gaming, both cards offer quite a lot. You can expect high FPS counts from both the RTX 2060 and 2070 but again the 2070 would be the better choice if you use a high refresh rate monitor.

The RTX 2070 is around 10-15% faster than the RTX 2060 and blows the older Pascal GTX 1070 out of the water. The RTX 2070 does even better than the older GTX 1070 TI and 1080.

The RTX 2060 delivers great frame rates when compared to its older sibling, the GTX 1060. In fact, upgrading would be a massive quality of life improvement, with the RTX 2060 out doing the GTX 1070 too.

The RTX 20-series of GPUs has been a great gift from Nvidia, with the manufacturer cementing its place at the top of the GPU pile. In regards to Nvidia’s RTX 2060 Vs. 2070, either card in most circumstances would bring you a lot of joy. It is no doubt that the RTX 2070 is the one to go for if you are looking to game on a 1440p monitor and the 2070 has a bit more juice to at least attempt AAA titles in 4K.

The RTX 2060 is a superb card in terms of value, the performance isn’t that far away from the 2070, making it ideal for those that play in 1080p or competitive games. Of course, with the appearance of the Super version of the RTX series, these older models are pretty much obsolete, with many retailers only stocking the Super versions.

In any case, both are going to be superb additions to your build and it will simply come down to budget and personal preference.