Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB review: an all-rounder that’s better all round

It’s no great leap forward from the 4060 Ti, but this GPU is faster, cheaper, and even more efficient

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Zotac Gaming GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB Twin Edge specs: CUDA Cores: 4608 Base Clock Speed: 2.41GHz Boost Clock Speed: 2.57GHz VRAM: 16GB GDDR7 Power: 180W Recommended System Power: 600W Price: From £399 / $429

If PC gaming was a house, the chairs, tables, and at least one pouffe would be make out of Nvidia XX60 graphics cards . No other GPU lineage accounts for as many builds or playing hours, though the fact that we love them so much does make it hurt worse when they go astray. As the 16GB version of the RTX 4060 Ti did, when it launched at a withering $499.

This time, the RTX 5060 Ti is still getting separate 8GB and 16GB flavours, but Nvidia have remembered that yes, this is still supposed to be a mid-range card. Thus: price cuts, with the 8GB model starting from £349 / $379 and the 16GB from a sharply dropped £399 / $429. The gen-on-gen speed upgrade is merely moderate, though between that cost cutting, the option of DLSS 4 and Multi Frame Generation (MFG), and performance-per-watt that beats the already efficient 4060 Ti, it still makes for a reasonably appealing new addition to the GeForce dynasty.

I’m reviewing the 16GB version here, or to be more exact, the Zotac Gaming GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB Twin Edge. Which, for the record, is an excellent bit of third-party card building, being almost unnervingly quiet under load despite GPU temperatures only peaking at 61°c. Its use of a totally bog-standard 8-pin power connector also hints at the RTX 5060 Ti’s frugal power needs, with both 8GB and 16GB versions rated at 180W – easily enough to get by without one of Nvidia’s tendrilly, multi-plugged adapters.

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In fact, I barely even approached that maximum in all my hours of playing and benchmarking the RTX 5060 Ti. It instead peaked at just 155W during a spirited Cyberpunk 2077 session, which is actually just below the peak wattage of 157W I measured on my 8GB RTX 4060 Ti. If efficiency and cooling form the base of your hierarchy of GPU needs, it’ll be worth waiting until May to see how the 145W-rated RTX 5060 fares as well, but good on the RTX 5060 Ti for outmanoeuvring its immediate predecessor on what is – or was – one of its biggest strengths.

Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB review: 1440p benchmarks

The RTX 5060 Ti continues the grand old XX60 Ti tradition of smooth yet relatively budget-friendly 1440p performance. And, next to the pricier RTX 5070 , it makes more of an effort push native-rez, pre-DLSS framerates forward from the days of the 40 series.

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The RPS test PC: CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D RAM: 32GB Trident Z5 Neo RGB DDR5 Motherboard: MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi PSU: NZXT C1000 Gold

Averaged across all seven games, the 16GB RTX 5060 Ti works out about 19% faster than the 8GB RTX 4060 Ti, an acceptable (if not terribly dramatic) improvement. That might also be an unfair comparison, were it not for the fact that the 16GB RTX 4060 Ti is, by all accounts, barely any quicker than the 8GB version. Hence the aforementioned hurt.

That does also raise the question of whether the 8GB RTX 5060 Ti is the better deal as well, and I wish I had the time to get one in on these graphs. I do suspect, though, that now that the 16GB version imposes much less of a financial burden, the extra VRAM could very feasibly make it worthwhile. The last two years have seen higher-fidelity games get ravenously hungry for memory, and at 1440p especially, having that bigger buffer could help more than it did in 2023.

In any case, you’re also looking at a substantial performance uptick from the RTX 3060 Ti – good news if you skipped the RTX 40 generation altogether – and again, that upgrade to performance-per-watt isn’t nothing. As a sub-£500 option for fast 1440p, then, the RTX 5060 Ti delivers, often without needing to resort to upscaling at all.

That said, DLSS 4 remains the best of its kind. AMD’s FSR 4 makes encouraging improvements, but to my eyes still doesn’t match DLSS sharpness. And, in terms of straight numbers, the RTX 5060 Ti’s MFG support lets it pull much further away from the 4060 Ti when frame generation is involved.

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I don’t actually endorse path tracing on the RTX 5060 Ti at this resolution – it will handle regular ray tracing with just a dash of DLSS upscaling, but nobody should buy a cutting-edge GPU just to sit around the 30fps mark. Nonetheless. This GPU does achieve general playability where the RTX 40 mid-rangers don’t, and with 4x MFG it’s capable of more than doubling their best showings. That came with heaps of added input lag, mind, so if you do fancy some frame gen, I’d recommend reducing your quality settings at the same time. This will help secure the supply of ‘real’ frames, which in turn will help limit latency spikes.

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Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 16GB review: 1080p benchmarks

As you’d hope, the RTX 5060 Ti is comfortably equipped to handle max-quality, native-rez games at Full HD. Its average performance increase over the RTX 4060 Ti contracts slightly, to 18%, but it’s still a more meaningful and consistent upgrade than the RTX 5070 is over the RTX 4070 Super.

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That said, the last-gen model is hardly getting its ribs kicked in either, and since both GPUs often hang out in the same 80fps+ area, it’s sometimes harder to spot the difference than it is at 1440p. That does change, however, when you start slapping on the really high-end visual options.

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By staying above 40fps in both these games, the RTX 5060 Ti arguably becomes the first XX60 card that can really, truly cope with path tracing. With Alan Wake 2 in particular, there’s a noticeable difference in smoothness between the 4060 Ti’s 36fps and the 43fps of the new model, as these kinds of framerates are (unlike the rasterised results above) well below the point where diminishing returns spoil the fun. Despite an oddly limited 4x MFG result in the same game, that stronger framerate base also makes the 5060 Ti better suited to frame generation.

I’d still want to see how the Ti-less RTX 5060 performs at 1080p before parting with any cash – the 8GB VRAM limit is starting to look a tad old-fashioned, but it’s still fine for 1080p rigs that aren’t minded to switch to 1440p anytime soon. And I’d still take the RTX 5060 Ti over its more immediately available rivals: besides the RTX 4060 Ti lagging behind on both straight performance and performance-per-watt, the Intel Arc B580 comes in a lot cheaper but a lot slower as well. The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT gives an encouraging first glance – I only have benchmark results from the old RPS test rig, hence why it’s not in these graphs, but at 1080p it did average 121fps in Cyberpunk 2077 and 107fps in Metro Exodus , so on a newer CPU it should run very slightly faster for about the same cash as this 16GB RTX 5060 Ti. However, it lacks the FSR 4 support that’s currently exclusive to the very latest RX 9000 GPUs , leaving it without a convincing consolation prize for simultaneously forgoing DLSS 4.

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We can therefore chalk the RTX 5060 Ti as one of the more successful RTX 50 graphics cards, and the current de facto choice for – at the very least – 1440p on a budget. This specific Zotac model also makes a convincing case for itself, impressing on thermals and quietness even while sticking to the 16GB GPU’s base price of £399.

In the UK, anyway. The toupéed elephant in the room, of course, is the looming impact of US tariffs on computing hardware. There’s no smartphone-style exemption for graphics cards, so it would be troubling yet unsurprising if the RTX 5060 Ti suddenly gets pricier in the States. That would, in truth, make it a harder sell – though I suppose since all the other alternatives would suffer the same fate, there would be a kind of equality to the misery.

This review is based on a retail unit provided by the manufacturer.

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All 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints and where to get them

These areas have the highest chance of giving you Blueprints

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Looking for more Arc Raiders Blueprints? It’s a special day when you find a Blueprint, as they’re among the most valuable items in Arc Raiders. If you find a Blueprint that you haven’t already found, then you must make sure you hold onto it at all costs, because Blueprints are the key to one of the most important and powerful systems of meta-progression in the game.

This guide aims to be the very best guide on Blueprints you can find, starting with a primer on what exactly they are and how they work in Arc Raiders, before delving into exactly where to get Blueprints and the very best farming spots for you to take in your search.

We’ll also go over how to get Blueprints from other unlikely activities, such as destroying Surveyors and completing specific quests. And you’ll also find the full list of all 75 Blueprints in Arc Raiders on this page (including the newest Blueprints added with the Cold Snap update , such as the Deadline Blueprint and Firework Box Blueprint), giving you all the information you need to expand your own crafting repertoire.

In this guide:

• What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?
• Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes
• Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders Blueprints obtained from quests Blueprints obtained from Trials Best Blueprint farming locations

What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?

Blueprints in Arc Raiders are special items which, if you manage to extract with them, you can expend to permanently unlock a new crafting recipe in your Workshop. If you manage to extract from a raid with an Anvil Blueprint, for example, you can unlock the ability to craft your very own Anvil Pistol, as many times as you like (as long as you have the crafting materials).

To use a Blueprint, simply open your Inventory while in the lobby, then right-click on the Blueprint and click “Learn And Consume” . This will permanently unlock the recipe for that item in your Workshop. As of the Stella Montis update, there are allegedly 75 different Blueprints to unlock - although only 68 are confirmed to be in the game so far. You can see all the Blueprints you’ve found and unlocked by going to the Workshop menu, and hitting “R” to bring up the Blueprint screen.

It’s possible to find duplicates of past Blueprints you’ve already unlocked. If you find these, then you can either sell them, or - if you like to play with friends - you can take it into a match and gift it to your friend so they can unlock that recipe for themselves. Another option is to keep hold of them until the time comes to donate them to the Expedition.

Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes

Below is the full list of all the Blueprints that are currently available to find in Arc Raiders, and the crafting recipe required for each item:

Note: The missing Blueprints in this list likely have not actually been added to the game at the time of writing, because none of the playerbase has managed to find any of them. As they are added to the game, I will update this page with the most relevant information so you know exactly how to get all 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints.

Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders

Below is a list of all containers, modifiers, and events which maximise your chances of finding Blueprints:

• Certain quests reward you with specific Blueprints .
• Completing Trials has a high chance of offering Blueprints as rewards.
• Surveyors have a decent chance of dropping Blueprints on death.
• High loot value areas tend to have a greater chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Night Raids and Storms may increase rare Blueprint spawn chances in containers.
• Containers with higher numbers of items may have a higher tendency to spawn Blueprints. As a result, Blue Gate (which has many “large” containers containing multiple items) may give you a higher chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Raider containers (Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, Medical Bags, Grenade Tubes) have increased Blueprint drop rates. As a result, the Uncovered Caches event gives you a high chance of finding Blueprints.
• Security Lockers have a higher than average chance of containing Blueprints.
• Certain Blueprints only seem to spawn under specific circumstances: Tempest Blueprint only spawns during Night Raid events. Vulcano Blueprint only spawns during Hidden Bunker events. Jupiter and Equaliser Blueprints only spawn during Harvester events.

Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, and other raider-oriented container types have a good chance of offering Blueprints. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints have a very low chance of spawning in any container in Arc Raiders, around 1-2% on average. However, there is a higher chance of finding Blueprints in particular container types. Specifically, you can find more Blueprints in Raider containers and security lockers.

Beyond this, if you’re looking for Blueprints you should focus on regions of the map which are marked as having particularly high-value loot. Areas such as the Control Tower in Dam Battlegrounds, the Arrival and Departure Buildings in Spaceport, and Pilgrim’s Peak in Blue Gate all have a better-than-average chance of spawning Blueprints somewhere amongst all their containers. Night Raids and Electromagnetic Storm events also increase the drop chances of certain Blueprints .

In addition to these containers, you can often loot Blueprints from destroyed Surveyors - the largest of the rolling ball ARC. Surveyors are more commonly found on the later maps - Spaceport and Blue Gate - and if one spawns in your match, you’ll likely see it by the blue laser beam that it casts into the sky while “surveying”.

Surveyors are quite well-armoured and will very speedily run away from you once it notices you, but if you can take one down then make sure you loot all its parts for a chance of obtaining certain unusual Blueprints.

Blueprints obtained from quests

One way in which you can get Blueprints is by completing certain quests for the vendors in Speranza. Some quests will reward you with a specific item Blueprint upon completion, so as long as you work through all the quests in Arc Raiders, you are guaranteed those Blueprints.

Here is the full list of all Blueprints you can get from quest rewards:

• Trigger Nade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Sparks Fly”.
• Lure Grenade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Greasing Her Palms”.
• Burletta Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Industrial Espionage”.
• Hullcracker Blueprint (and Launcher Ammo Blueprint): Rewarded after completing “The Major’s Footlocker”.

Alas, that’s only 4 Blueprints out of a total of 75 to unlock, so for the vast majority you will need to find them yourself during a raid. If you’re intent on farming Blueprints, then it’s best to equip yourself with cheap gear in case you lose it, but don’t use a free loadout because then you won’t get a safe pocket to stash any new Blueprint you find. No pain in Arc Raiders is sharper than failing to extract with a new Blueprint you’ve been after for a dozen hours already.

One of the best ways to get Blueprints is by hitting three stars on all five Trials every week. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints obtained from Trials

One of the very best ways to get Blueprints is as rewards for completing Trials in Arc Raiders. Trials are unlocked from Level 15 onwards, and allow you to earn rewards by focusing on certain tasks over the course of several raids. For example, one Trial might task you with dealing damage to Hornets, while another might challenge you to loot Supply Drops.

Trials refresh on a weekly basis, with a new week bringing five new Trials. Each Trial can offer up to three rewards after passing certain score milestones, and it’s possible to receive very high level loot from these reward crates - including Blueprints. So if you want to unlock as many Blueprints as possible, you should make a point of completing as many Trials as possible each week.

Best Blueprint farming locations

The very best way to get Blueprints is to frequent specific areas of the maps which combine high-tier loot pools with the right types of containers to search. Here are my recommendations for where to find Blueprints on every map, so you can always keep the search going for new crafting recipes to unlock.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Dam Battlegrounds

The best places to farm Blueprints on Dam Battlegrounds are the Control Tower, Power Generation Complex, Ruby Residence, and Pale Apartments . The first two regions, despite only being marked on the map as mid-tier loot, contain a phenomenal number of containers to loot. The Control Tower can also contain a couple of high-tier Security Lockers - though of course, you’ll need to have unlocked the Security Breach skill at the end of the Survival tree.

There’s also a lot of reporting amongst the playerbase that the Residential areas in the top-left of the map - Pale Apartments and Ruby Residence - give you a comparatively strong chance of finding Blueprints. Considering their size, there’s a high density of containers to loot in both locations, and they also have the benefit of being fairly out of the way. So you’re more likely to have all the containers to yourself.

Buried City

The best Blueprint farming locations on Buried City are the Santa Maria Houses, Grandioso Apartments, Town Hall, and the various buildings of the New District . Grandioso Apartments has a lower number of containers than the rest, but a high chance of spawning weapon cases - which have good Blueprint drop rates. The others are high-tier loot areas, with plenty of lootable containers - including Security Lockers.

Spaceport

The best places to find Blueprints on Spaceport are the Arrival and Departure Buildings, as well as Control Tower A6 and the Launch Towers . All these areas are labelled as high-value loot regions, and many of them are also very handily connected to one another by the Spaceport wall, which you can use to quickly run from one area to the next. At the tops of most of these buildings you’ll find at least one Security Locker, so this is an excellent farming route for players looking to find Blueprints.

The downside to looting Blueprints on Spaceport is that all these areas are hotly contested, particularly in Duos and Squads. You’ll need to be very focused and fast in order to complete the full farming route.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blue Gate

Blue Gate tends to have a good chance of dropping Blueprints, potentially because it generally has a high number of containers which can hold lots of items; so there’s a higher chance of a Blueprint spawning in each container. In my experience, the best Blueprint farming spots on Blue Gate are Pilgrim’s Peak, Raider’s Refuge, the Ancient Fort, and the Underground Complex beneath the Warehouse .

All of these areas contain a wealth of containers to loot. Raider’s Refuge has less to loot, but the majority of the containers in and around the Refuge are raider containers, which have a high chance of containing Blueprints - particularly during major events.

Stella Montis

On the whole, Stella Montis seems to have a very low drop rate for Blueprints (though a high chance of dropping other high-tier loot). If you do want to try farming Blueprints on this map, the best places to find Blueprints in Stella Montis are Medical Research, Assembly Workshop, and the Business Center . These areas have the highest density of containers to loot on the map.

In addition to this, the Western Tunnel has a few different Security Lockers to loot, so while there’s very little to loot elsewhere in this area of the map, it’s worth hitting those Security Lockers if you spawn there at the start of a match.

That wraps up this primer on how to get all the Blueprints in Arc Raiders as quickly as possible. With the Expedition system constantly resetting a large number of players’ Blueprints, it’s more important than ever to have the most up-to-date information on where to find all these Blueprints.

While you’re here, be sure to check out our Arc Raiders best guns tier list , as well as our primers on the best skills to unlock and all the different Field Depot locations on every map.

ARC Raiders

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

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