Intel's Flagship Core i9-12900K 'Alder Lake' Beats AMD Ryzen 9 5950X in Geekbench

Intel 12th Generation Alder Lake
(Image credit: Intel)

As Intel is gearing up to start sales of its 12th Generation Core 'Alder Lake' processors sometime in October (at least according to Noctua), the company is sending out samples of these CPUs to a wide range of its OEM customers, which is why it is inevitable that benchmark results will leak. This week we already saw Intel's Core i7-12700 Geekbenched, now it is time for the company's flagship Core i9-12900K chip to show its potential in Geekbench 5. Surprisingly, it outperforms AMD's beastly Ryzen 9 5950X in threaded work. 

Intel's Core i9-12900K processor is meant to have all the advantages that the Alder Lake architecture has to offer, including eight high-performance Golden Cove cores (P-cores) with Hyper-Threading and eight energy-efficient Goldmont (E-cores) equipped with a 30MB L3 cache and operating at high clock speeds. The final frequencies of the Core i9-12900K chip are unknown, but if a recent Geekbench 5 database entry is to be believed, the CPU will have a 3.20 GHz base clock rate. For some reason, the benchmark could not determine the maximum Turbo frequency of the chip, but we believe that it is at or above the 5.0 GHz mark. 

Just like with the Core i7-12700 earlier this week, we are not going to compare the overall single-thread and multi-thread scores of Alder Lake in Geekbench 5 (due to the unfairly overweighted impact of crypto performance in the benchmark and a lack of AVX-512 support in Alder Lake), but focus on integer and float performance. 

Swipe to scroll horizontally
Header Cell - Column 0 Core i9-12900KCore i9-11900KRyzen 9 5950XApple M1
General specifications8P, 8E, 3.20 ~ ? GHz, 30MB8P, 3.50 ~ 5.10 GHz, 16MB16, 3.40 ~ 5.0 GHz, 64MB4P, 4E, up to 3.20 GHz
Single-Core | Integer1614160714351597
Single-Core | Float1980187218811896
Single-Core | Crypto4990600840892783
Single-Core | Score1893190717021746
Row 5 - Cell 0 Row 5 - Cell 1 Row 5 - Cell 2 Row 5 - Cell 3 Row 5 - Cell 4
Multi-Core | Integer1713312051166957013
Multi-Core | Float1858813064186958624
Multi-Core | Crypto1171710090814510137
Multi-Core | Score1729912257168687653
Linkhttps://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/9509437https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/9503076https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/9506672https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/9496959

As it turns out, the upcoming Core i9-12900K packs quite the punch. It outperforms all contemporary top-of-the-range CPUs from Intel, AMD, and Apple in single-threaded integer and single-threaded floating point workload. As a result, the new CPU not only leaves behind its rival from the red camp but even beats Apple's M1, which is known for its single-threaded performance because of its 'wide' execution pipeline. Of course, the Alder Lake has a massive L3 cache and microarchitectural advantages and consumes much more power, but its single-thread results are still very impressive. 

Yet, the Core i9-12900K truly shines in multi-threaded workloads. Since the CPU packs in 16 cores in total and can process up to 24 threads at once, it naturally smashes Intel's eight-core Core i9-11900K and Apple's hybrid eight-core M1 SoC. Thus, it's remarkable that it beats AMD's 16-core Ryzen 9 5950X (which can execute 32 threads) in integer multi-threaded workloads but loses by 107 points in floating point multi-threaded workloads.

While the performance of the Core i9-12900K in Geekbench 5 looks quite remarkable, keep in mind that we are dealing with pre-production hardware, and some things may change. In any case, take these results with a grain of salt for now. 

Anton Shilov
Contributing Writer

Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends.

  • peachpuff
    Everything will depend how they price it.
    Reply
  • waltc3
    Always skeptical of comparisons using only a single benchmark...;) Caveat Emptor.
    Reply
  • Integr8d
    As long as it doesn’t have a TDP of 500w and you have to run it in a deep freezer, bravo Intel.
    Reply
  • Soul_keeper
    16 cores, but 24 threads. This should be an interesting variable in many benchmarks.
    considering avx-512 optimized programs compared to avx2 on Ryzen with it's 16 core 32 threads.
    Reply
  • Kamen Rider Blade
    Core i9-12900K vs Ryzen 5950X
    + Single-Core:
    -> Integer = +12.4%
    -> Float…… = + 5.3%
    -> Crypto… = +22.0%
    -> Score…… = +11.2%

    + Multi-Core:
    -> Integer = + 2.6%
    -> Float…… = - 0.5%
    -> Crypto… = +43.9%
    -> Score…… = + 2.6%

    Soul_keeper said:
    16 cores, but 24 threads. This should be an interesting variable in many benchmarks.
    considering avx-512 optimized programs compared to avx2 on Ryzen with it's 16 core 32 threads.
    AVX-512 has been removed from AlderLake for consumer chips, literally fused off.

    Instruction Sets: Alder Lake Dumps AVX-512 in a BIG Way
    So Consumer AlderLake Cores can't do AVX-512 while XEON based Sapphire Rapids with the Golden Cove cores will have access to AVX-512 circuit path.
    Reply
  • JfromNucleon
    Soul_keeper said:
    considering avx-512 optimized programs compared to avx2 on Ryzen with it's 16 core 32 threads.
    Well, AVX-512 was removed from alder lake for consumers iirc
    Reply
  • Soaptrail
    Kamen Rider Blade said:
    Core i9-12900K vs Ryzen 5950X
    + Single-Core:
    -> Integer = +12.4%
    -> Float…… = + 5.3%
    -> Crypto… = +22.0%
    -> Score…… = +11.2%

    + Multi-Core:
    -> Integer = + 2.6%
    -> Float…… = - 0.5%
    -> Crypto… = +43.9%
    -> Score…… = + 2.6%


    AVX-512 has been removed from AlderLake for consumer chips, literally fused off.

    Instruction Sets: Alder Lake Dumps AVX-512 in a BIG Way
    So Consumer AlderLake Cores can't do AVX-512 while XEON based Sapphire Rapids with the Golden Cove cores will have access to AVX-512 circuit path.
    Why did they cut it out? What impact will this have on consumers? My guesses are heat and no impact.
    Reply
  • stotty5
    Price and power will determine which chip is ultimately the best value. Knowing Intel's advertised TDP, being at base clock, and true TDP when running at full steam, they may not have truly outgunned AMD, just did more of their smoke and mirrors to try and compare apples to oranges.
    Reply
  • Makaveli
    lol and I love the title there is no smashing here, that kinda wording is inflamatory just to get the fans boys fighting.

    Intel's Flagship Core i9-12900K 'Alder Lake' Smashes Ryzen 9 5950X in Geekbench
    Kamen Rider Blade said:
    Core i9-12900K vs Ryzen 5950X
    + Single-Core:
    -> Integer = +12.4%
    -> Float…… = + 5.3%
    -> Crypto… = +22.0%
    -> Score…… = +11.2%

    + Multi-Core:
    -> Integer = + 2.6%
    -> Float…… = - 0.5%
    -> Crypto… = +43.9%
    -> Score…… = + 2.6%


    AVX-512 has been removed from AlderLake for consumer chips, literally fused off.

    Instruction Sets: Alder Lake Dumps AVX-512 in a BIG Way
    So Consumer AlderLake Cores can't do AVX-512 while XEON based Sapphire Rapids with the Golden Cove cores will have access to AVX-512 circuit path.



    do me a favor can you redo the numbers. The Scores for their 5950X are low.

    Reply
  • gggplaya
    waltc3 said:
    Always skeptical of comparisons using only a single benchmark...;) Caveat Emptor.

    Always skeptical of Intel marketing ploys period!! They've done shady marketing in the past as pointed out by AdoredTV.

    The wattage of this beast will also be a factor here.
    Reply