Nvidia could bring back the RTX 3060 12GB in July as memory crisis continues

[midian182]

Winners & losers: The long-rumored return of the RTX 3060 12GB – a necessity brought about by the memory crisis – could finally happen this summer. According to reports, major board partners including Asus, MSI, Colorful, and Galax will soon receive new allocations of chips ahead of mass production starting in July.

The new claims come from the Chinese forum Board Channels. A user writes that production of the RTX 3060 12GB GPUs (as opposed to the 8GB variant) will resume in June before being allocated to add-in card manufacturers, with the retail (re)launch coming in July. The card was originally discontinued in 2024.

While posts on Board Channels have proved accurate in the past, they're usually best taken with a grain of salt. However, this one does align with what MEGAsizeGPU said last month.

– MEGAsizeGPU (@Zed__Wang) April 17, 2026

The reputable leaker said a long-rumored version of Nvidia's RTX 5050 had been delayed and might never launch, so the new RTX 3060 would fill the gap by launching in June.

Despite arriving over five years ago with a $329 MSRP, the RTX 3060 remains the most popular GPU on the Steam survey, illustrating its enduring popularity.

Most popular GPUs among Steam survey participants during March

The Board Channels poster writes that the RTX 3060 price is expected to remain relatively high, despite its disadvantages in terms of both cost-effectiveness and performance compared to the RTX 5050 and 5060 series.

As we noted previously, some might wonder why Nvidia isn't bringing back the newer RTX 4060 instead of the RTX 3060. It's likely due to capacity. The RTX 4060 (AD107) is made on TSMC's custom 4N process, which Nvidia relies on for much of its newer lineup, so ramping that card back up could mean fighting for the same wafer capacity Nvidia wants reserved for higher-margin parts (I.e., those for AI products).

By comparison, the RTX 3060 (GA106) is an older Samsung 8N product, which could let Nvidia add volume without pulling from TSMC allocations.

Moreover, the fact the RTX 3060 12GB has 4GB more VRAM than the 8GB RTX 4060 makes it a more appealing prospect in an era where memory capacity has become a big selling point.

Team Green quietly launched the 12GB version of the RTX 5070 laptop GPU this week. The company said that while demand for its GeForce RTX GPUs remains strong, the memory crisis is causing issues. It added that it was launching this GPU to maximize memory availability.

Nvidia still hasn't officially confirmed it will relaunch the RTX 3060, but Jensen Huang did drop some hints in January. The CEO said at the time that releasing older cards featuring modern AI tech was a "good idea." It's just a shame that the state of the current market means releasing a two-generation-old card is something to celebrate.

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Nvidia could bring back the RTX 3060 12GB in July as memory crisis continues

 

[Megalomaniac]

As far as performance goes: you don't want to be on anything less than a 3090.

 

[noel24]

WOW! Anyone else ever thought We're gonna see new Dark Middle Ages, where We are communistically governed by a few of seemingly free market, trillion dollar companies, pushing buttons of democratically elected fasist-like dictatorships? Like, how more backwards can We go, before We have to pull out shovels and start to cultivate the land for vegetables, or outright forage for food in the forrest?
And I have geuine question - does those new trillionaires have plan for when societies collapse under Their greed? Cause running to Switzerland on Your private jet won't cut It, Switzerland is a "bank" state, relies on healthy global economy.

 

[Ghenrich]

Due to a memory shortage, Nvidia is relaunching and outdated GPU that has MORE MEMORY than the current entry level models? That doesn’t make any sense.

I know the 30 series uses older GDDR6, but the shortage applies to GDDR6 memory too, which is why consoles and AMD cards have been going up in price too.

We keep seeing this rumor but the explanation that it’s being relaunched because of the memory shortage makes no sense.

 

[noel24]

Due to a memory shortage, Nvidia is relaunching and outdated GPU that has MORE MEMORY than the current entry level models? That doesn’t make any sense.

I know the 30 series uses older GDDR6, but the shortage applies to GDDR6 memory too, which is why consoles and AMD cards have been going up in price too.

We keep seeing this rumor but the explanation that it’s being relaunched because of the memory shortage makes no sense.

Because It's not about fake memory shortage, but because of fake lithography shortage in general. They buy those wafers upfront, knowing well They will not be able to deploy Them. Not enough electricity in the world to deploy. No revenue streams anyway. Having a warehouse of chips boosts Their stocks. Maybe a potential consumer sales speculation scheme. Some speculation anyway. The problem will occur If They sit on It too long. Global economy will collapse, prices will drop, but consumers will not be interested anyway, fighting skyrocketing interest rates to keep... home's mortage, cost of living, food & health expenses. Gonna be a sh*t show worse than 2008.

 

[ddferrari]

Because It's not about fake memory shortage, but because of fake lithography shortage in general. They buy those wafers upfront, knowing well They will not be able to deploy Them. Not enough electricity in the world to deploy. No revenue streams anyway. Having a warehouse of chips boosts Their stocks. Maybe a potential consumer sales speculation scheme. Some speculation anyway. The problem will occur If They sit on It too long. Global economy will collapse, prices will drop, but consumers will not be interested anyway, fighting skyrocketing interest rates to keep... home's mortage, cost of living, food & health expenses. Gonna be a sh*t show worse than 2008.

We're talking about a graphics card here, not the end of society. Try to relax

 

[toooooot]

What a time to be alive (sarcasm)

 

[toooooot]

WOW! Anyone else ever thought We're gonna see new Dark Middle Ages, where We are communistically governed by a few of seemingly free market, trillion dollar companies, pushing buttons of democratically elected fasist-like dictatorships? Like, how more backwards can We go, before We have to pull out shovels and start to cultivate the land for vegetables, or outright forage for food in the forrest?
And I have geuine question - does those new trillionaires have plan for when societies collapse under Their greed? Cause running to Switzerland on Your private jet won't cut It, Switzerland is a "bank" state, relies on healthy global economy.

I have concluded long ago that the smartest people who made themselves billions using their brains, can degrade to incredible low IQ when greed comes into play. Probably something like: I will get all the billions I want just before this economy goes to sh*t.

 

[ScottSoapbox]

As long as your fine with 1080p 60 FPS in modern games, the 3060 can do that. Sometimes even on Max with RT but sometimes you’re turning down settings to hit 60 FPS (looking at you UE 5).

But the 5060 and RX 9060 are +50% faster raster and +100% with RT on so the reborn 3060s better be cheap or there’s no point.

The extra VRAM will allow better texture mods but you don’t have enough compute to hit the VRAM wall like the 3080 at 4K with RT exceeding 10GB.

 

[Rapob]

As long as your fine with 1080p 60 FPS in modern games, the 3060 can do that. Sometimes even on Max with RT but sometimes you’re turning down settings to hit 60 FPS (looking at you UE 5).

But the 5060 and RX 9060 are +50% faster raster and +100% with RT on so the reborn 3060s better be cheap or there’s no point.

The extra VRAM will allow better texture mods but you don’t have enough compute to hit the VRAM wall like the 3080 at 4K with RT exceeding 10GB.

3060 struggle in many demanding games at 1080p on high/ultra but sure if you think medium settings is fine then it will mostly do. DLSS saves the day and allows for high/ultra and luckily pretty much all demanding games have DLSS today.

RT is mostly pointless on these lower end cards. Not worth speaking about. Performance tanks. I don't see why anyone would enable it, over higher graphical settings.

12GB VRAM is decent still but without enough GPU power it won't matter much.

Who expect to run new and demanding games in 4K/UHD at Ultra settings with RT on a 6 year old 3080 tho?

So yeah, a GPU needs balance between GPU power and VRAM.

3060 12GB = Weaker GPU with too much VRAM, as the GPU can't play games on higher presets anyway but I guess too much VRAM is better than too little

3080 10GB = More powerful GPU with too little VRAM at times, 3080 12GB and 3080 Ti aged better

5070 12GB = Fairly balanced in both aspects

12GB is still plenty for most gamers. Almost no gamers play demanding games in native 4K. They might use a 4K monitor but uses upscaling.