GeForce RTX 5060 listing shows 12GB of VRAM and we hope it's real

The upcoming GeForce RTX 5060 specs leaked from industry insider @kopite7kimi a week ago. With 3840 CUDA Cores, a 25% increase over the GeForce RTX 4060, it should offer a decent performance increase over one of the most popular GPUs among PC gamers. The leak confirmed 8GB of GDDR7 VRAM for the GPU, offering a 50% bandwidth increase with the same capacity.

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A Chinese retailer has listed the GeForce RTX 5060 as having 12GB of VRAM, image credit: Videocardz.

Recently, a retail listing from an unknown Chinese retailer (via Videocardz) listed higher-than-expected pricing for the upcoming GeForce RTX 5060 and RTX 5060 Ti. The interesting thing about the listing is that it shows the GeForce RTX 5060 having 12GB of VRAM - the first time we've seen this configuration online.

Based on the source's unknown quantity, it's probably safe to say that the GeForce RTX 5060 will launch with 8GB of fast GDDR7 memory. This has been widely reported for a while now. Ultimately, this has raised our hopes of a new mainstream GPU from NVIDIA with 12GB of VRAM especially when we're reminded that the popular GeForce RTX 3060 launched with 12GB of VRAM back in 2021.

Would an additional 4GB of VRAM make a big difference to in-game performance? Well, it depends on the game, settings, and resolution - but the short answer is yes. For 1080p gaming there might not be any difference at all, and with 8GB of VRAM the GeForce RTX 5060 will be considered by media and gamers alike as a 1080p card first and foremost. With 12GB of VRAM, more games can be played at 1440p with high or ultra-like settings, and ray-tracing without having to tweak settings.

We found this when we reviewed the Intel Arc B580 GPU in December, the first 'Battlemage' card from Team Blue. Thanks to the inclusion of 12GB of VRAM, it delivered a 12% increase to 1440p performance. However, the Intel Arc B580's 1080p performance was only 6% faster than NVIDIA's current mainstream offering, which shows that the higher the resolution, the more VRAM you need.

With 8GB of GDDR7 memory, the GeForce RTX 5060 should still be able to deliver a notable performance increase over the GeForce RTX 3060 and the GeForce RTX 4060. Upping the VRAM capacity to 12GB could make the RTX 5060 one of the most impressive RTX Blackwell options.