1080p gaming has a new champion.
GeForce GTX 1660 Ti at a glance
How powerful is the GTX 1660 Ti? Comparable to the GTX 1070, making it well-suited to running the latest games at 1080p with ultra settings.When did the GTX 1660 Ti come out? The GTX 1660 Ti launched on 22 February 2019.
How much does the GTX 1660 Ti cost? RRP starts at around $469.
What is the GTX 1660 Ti?
The GeForce GTX 1660 Ti is an odd inclusion in Nvidia's line of graphics cards. Despite launching the RTX 20 series in late 2018 as the successor to the GTX 10 series, Nvidia decided to revive the GTX branding for the GTX 1660 Ti. As confusing as this might seem, it makes sense when you consider the pitch behind the GTX 1660 Ti: it's essentially an RTX 2060 with all the RTX-specific features stripped out.
This means the GTX 1660 Ti doesn't support real-time ray-tracing or the machine-learning capabilities baked into RTX graphics cards. It does benefit from the hardware improvements introduced with the RTX series' Turing architecture, though, and this allows it to deliver higher performance than many of its more expensive GTX siblings.
More importantly, the lack of RTX features allows Nvidia to price the GTX 1660 Ti far lower than its RTX cards. Better performance at a lower price is an attractive deal and for this reason the GTX 1660 Ti has replaced both the GTX 1060 and GTX 1070 as the go-to mid-range graphics card for 1080p gaming.
What features does the GTX 1660 Ti support?
While the GTX 1660 Ti removes the real-time ray-tracing and AI features that Nvidia championed with the RTX line, it still supports the other additions Nvidia introduced with its new Turing GPU architecture.
Some of the most noteworthy features include:
- Dedicated hardware encoder for better streaming performance
- VirtualLink for single-USB VR connections
- Nvidia NVLink for faster multi-GPU configurations
- HDCP 2.2
- OpenGL 4.5
- Display Port 1.4a with support for 8K resolution
- HMDI 2.0b
- Nvidia Ansel
- Nvidia Shadowplay
- G-Sync
- Variable Rate Shading
- Multi-view rendering
- VRWorks Audio
How powerful is the GTX 1660 Ti?
As the name implies, the GTX 1660 Ti is intended to sit between the GTX 1060 and GTX 1070. In reality, it lies much closer to the GTX 1070 than Nvidia's previous go-to budget card, with most benchmarks placing the GTX 1660 Ti and GTX 1070 neck and neck in terms of raw performance.
From a gaming perspective, this translates to solid 60fps performance at the highest graphical settings in most modern games. 1440p gaming should also be perfectly viable in most instances, though more-demanding games may require you to turn down a few settings in order to hit a stable 60fps.
All that grunt makes the GTX 1660 Ti a solid choice for gaming at higher refresh rates, too. 75Hz, 120Hz and even 144Hz are feasible, though you will likely need to settle for high or medium graphical settings in some games to achieve smooth performance.
GTX 1660 Ti availability and price
Nvidia launched the GTX 1660 Ti globally on 22 February 2019. Unlike its higher-tier siblings, there is no Nvidia Founder's Edition version of the GTX 1660 Ti, so you'll need to look to partner brands like Gigabyte, MSI and EVGA for their takes on Nvidia's standard specifications.
Pricing for the GTX 1660 Ti starts at around $469, with overclocked versions or those with additional cooling costing more.
GTX 1660 Ti specs
- Base clock speed
- 1500MHz
- Boost clock speed
- 1770MHz
- Memory
- 6GB GDDR6
- Memory speed
- 12Gbps
- Memory bus
- 192-bit
- Card length
- 144.78mm
- Card width
- Dual slot
- Card height
- 111mm
- Power draw
- 120W
- Recommended system power
- 450W
- Power connectors
- 8-pin
- No. HDMI ports
- 1
- No. Display Ports
- 1
- No. DVI ports
- 1
- DirectX support
- 12
