GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB 9Gbps vs Radeon HD 7870

Primary details

GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.

Place in the ranking405not rated
Place by popularitynot in top-100not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation2.99no data
Power efficiency4.70no data
ArchitectureGCN 1.0 (2011−2020)Pascal (2016−2021)
GPU code namePitcairnGP106
Market segmentDesktopDesktop
Release date5 March 2012 (12 years ago)20 April 2017 (7 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)$349 $299

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance to price ratio. The higher, the better.

no data

Detailed specifications

General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.

Pipelines / CUDA cores12801280
Core clock speed1000 MHz1506 MHz
Boost clock speedno data1709 MHz
Number of transistors2,800 million4,400 million
Manufacturing process technology28 nm16 nm
Power consumption (TDP)175 Watt120 Watt
Texture fill rate80.00136.7
Floating-point processing power2.56 TFLOPS4.375 TFLOPS
ROPs3248
TMUs8080

Form factor & compatibility

Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).

InterfacePCIe 3.0 x16PCIe 3.0 x16
Length241 mm250 mm
Width2-slot2-slot
Supplementary power connectors2x 6-pin1x 6-pin

VRAM capacity and type

Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.

Memory typeGDDR5GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount2 GB6 GB
Memory bus width256 Bit192 Bit
Memory clock speed1200 MHz2257 MHz
Memory bandwidth153.6 GB/s216.7 GB/s
Shared memory--

Connectivity and outputs

Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.

Display Connectors1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 3x DisplayPort
Eyefinity+-
HDMI++

API compatibility

List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.

DirectX12 (11_1)12 (12_1)
Shader Model5.16.4
OpenGL4.64.6
OpenCL1.21.2
Vulkan1.2.1311.2.131
CUDA-6.1

Pros & cons summary


Recency 5 March 2012 20 April 2017
Maximum RAM amount 2 GB 6 GB
Chip lithography 28 nm 16 nm
Power consumption (TDP) 175 Watt 120 Watt

GTX 1060 6 GB 9Gbps has an age advantage of 5 years, a 200% higher maximum VRAM amount, a 75% more advanced lithography process, and 45.8% lower power consumption.

We couldn't decide between Radeon HD 7870 and GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB 9Gbps. We've got no test results to judge.


Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.

Vote for your favorite

Do you think we are right or mistaken in our choice? Vote by clicking "Like" button near your favorite graphics card.


AMD Radeon HD 7870
Radeon HD 7870
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB 9Gbps
GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB 9Gbps

Comparisons with similar GPUs

We selected several comparisons of graphics cards with performance close to those reviewed, providing you with more options to consider.

Community ratings

Here you can see the user ratings of the compared graphics cards, as well as rate them yourself.


3.7 641 vote

Rate Radeon HD 7870 on a scale of 1 to 5:

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
4 73 votes

Rate GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB 9Gbps on a scale of 1 to 5:

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Questions & comments

Here you can ask a question about this comparison, agree or disagree with our judgements, or report an error or mismatch.