NVIDIA Reportedly Plans to Bring Back RTX 3060 Due to DRAM Shortages
"It better be 12 gigs."
With the AI industry effectively crippling PC gaming – and, to a lesser extent, gaming overall – by driving hardware prices to some absurd levels, it appears that NVIDIA, undeniably one of, if not the biggest beneficiary of the AI boom, is looking to ease a crisis it itself has inadvertently helped create by rewinding the clock half a decade and bringing back the GeForce RTX 3060 GPU, discontinued in August 2024.
As reported by NVIDIA insider hongxing2020 in a January 5 update, NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3060 is reportedly slated for a comeback sometime in Q1 2026, presumably as a result of the rapidly rising cost of GDDR7 DRAM used in the latest RTX 5000 series.
Unfortunately, the insider provided little additional detail, leaving it unclear – assuming the claim proves accurate in the first place – which specific RTX 3060 variant (8GB, 12GB, Ti GDDR6, or Ti GDDR6X) NVIDIA plans to resume production of.
It also remains unknown why NVIDIA would choose to bet on the 3060 series rather than the newer, yet also GDDR6-based, RTX 4060, although the decision may have something to do with GeForce RTX 3060 still being the most widely used GPU among PC gamers nearly five years and two full generations later.
Recently, it was also reported that GeForce NOW, NVIDIA's cloud gaming service, is set to receive full native Linux support later this year, though, much like the claims of the RTX 3060 reentering production, this remains an unconfirmed rumor.
That said, it is claimed that an official announcement will be made at CES 2026, the tech industry's biggest conference, opening later today on January 6, so at least we won't have to wait long to find out for sure. And who knows – maybe official confirmation of the 2021 GPU's return will happen there as well, so it's highly advisable to follow CES updates as closely as you can.
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