Home > CPU Comparison > Core i5 10400F or Ryzen 5 3600: what's better?

Intel Core i5 10400F vs AMD Ryzen 5 3600

34 out of 100
Intel Core i5 10400F
VS
39 out of 100
AMD Ryzen 5 3600
Intel Core i5 10400F
AMD Ryzen 5 3600

We compared two 6-core desktop CPUs: the 2.9 GHz Intel Core i5 10400F against the 3.6 GHz AMD Ryzen 5 3600. On this page, you'll find out which processor has better performance in benchmarks, games and other useful information.

  1. Review
  2. Differences
  3. Performance
  4. Specs
  5. Comments (8)

Review

General overview and comparison of the processors
Single-Core Performance
Performance in single-threaded apps and benchmarks
Multi-Core Performance
Measure performance when all cores are involved
Power Efficiency
The efficiency score of power consumption
The "iGPU" and "Power Efficiency" have a minor impact on the NanoReview Score for desktop CPU.
NanoReview Final Score
Choose your main usage scenario to recalculate the Final Score and see which CPU suits your needs.
πŸ”Œ Usage Scenario:

Value for money (Beta)

Global average CPU prices are used by default! For better accuracy, enter your current prices and click β€œCalculate".
Currency
VS
34.3
(Mediocre)
Value Index
104.9
(Excellent)

Key Differences

What are the key differences between 3600 and 10400F
Advantages of Intel Core i5 10400F
  • Newer - released 10 months later
  • 2% higher Turbo Boost frequency (4.3 GHz vs 4.2 GHz)
Advantages of AMD Ryzen 5 3600
  • Has 20 MB larger L3 cache size, helping fully utilize a high-end GPU in gaming
  • More modern manufacturing process – 7 versus 14 nanometers
  • Unlocked multiplier
  • Newer PCI Express version – 4.0
  • Around 6.08 GB/s (15%) higher theoretical memory bandwidth
  • 14% faster in a single-core Geekbench v6 test - 1662 vs 1459 points

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks
CPU:
Core i5 10400F
vs
Ryzen 5 3600

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
Cinebench 2026 (Single) 353 388
Cinebench 2026 (Multi) 1994 2039
Submit your benchmark results

GeekBench v6

The new version of this benchmark emulates common operations often used in real-world apps
Geekbench 6 (Single-Core)
Core i5 10400F
1459
Ryzen 5 3600 +14%
1662
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
Core i5 10400F
6263
Ryzen 5 3600 +16%
7249
File compression 452.1 MB/sec 660.6 MB/sec
Clang compilation 50.3 Klines/sec 59 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 139.6 pages/sec 146 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 190.7 Mpixels/sec 207.8 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 151 pages/sec 143.3 pages/sec
Background blur 33.8 images/sec 37 images/sec
Photo processing 51.9 images/sec 54.2 images/sec
Ray tracing 10.3 Mpixels/sec 12.9 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] – 435 & 1134 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Core i5 10400F
12095
Ryzen 5 3600 +46%
17667
Integer math 41.5 GOps/sec 48.5 GOps/sec
Floating point math 26 GOps/sec 28.6 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 35M Primes/sec 109M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 23.2M Strings/sec 23.6M Strings/sec
Data encryption 4.1 GBytes/sec 13.9 GBytes/sec
Data compression 186 MBytes/sec 219.6 MBytes/sec
Physics 694 Frames/sec 1146 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 12.5B Matrices/sec 14.4B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] – 9127 & 37442 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
Core i5 10400F
112
Ryzen 5 3600 +21%
135.61

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 6.7 PPW 7.9 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 96.4 PPW 111.5 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 186.1 PPW 271.8 PPW
Blender / Watt 1.72 PPW 2.09 PPW
These are rough calculations, as most CPUs surpass PL1 TDP wattage even in multicore workloads.

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
Intel Core i5 10400F
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-07-30 (Semant)Cinebench 2026353 / 1994
πŸ“˜ 2026-04-05 (Manav Sehgal)Cinebench 2026351 / 1884
πŸ“˜ 2025-09-11 (KingdomGaming)Cinebench 202464 / 438
Add View all (3)
AMD Ryzen 5 3600
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-07-16 (abdou)Cinebench 2026388 / 2039
πŸ“˜ 2026-03-31 (Ike)Cinebench 202470 / 517
πŸ“˜ 2025-12-16 -> JeromeneilCinebench 202471 / 511
πŸ“˜ 2025-11-02 (BeastAsLow)Cinebench 202464 / 479
πŸ“˜ 2025-10-17 (RandomStorm)Cinebench 202472 / 419
Add View all (15)

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core i5 10400F and AMD Ryzen 5 3600

General

Vendor Intel Amd
Released May 1, 2020 July 7, 2019
Type Desktop Desktop
Instruction Set x86-64 x86-64
Codename Comet Lake Zen 2 (Matisse)
Model number i5-10400F -
Integrated GPU No No
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 5 3600 -
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 5 225F - AMD Ryzen 5 7600
AMD Ryzen CPU ranking (#163rd place)

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 6 6
P-Threads 12 12
Base Frequency (P) 2.9 GHz 3.6 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 4.3 GHz 4.2 GHz
Total
Total Cores 6 6
Total Threads 12 12
Bus Frequency 100 MHz 100 MHz
Multiplier 29x 36x
Bus Bandwidth 8 GT/s -
L1 Cache 64K (per core) 64K (per core)
L2 Cache 256K (per core) 512K (per core)
L3 Cache 12MB (shared) 32MB (shared)
Unlocked Multiplier No Yes

Package

Transistors - 3.8 billions
Fabrication Process 14 nm 7 nm
TDP (PL1) 65 W 65 W
Socket LGA-1200 AM4
Peak Temperature 100Β°C 95Β°C
Desktop CPU ranking (162nd and 152nd place)

Memory Support

Memory Types - DDR4-2666 - DDR4-3200
Max. Memory Size 128 GB 128 GB
Memory Channels 2 2
Max. Memory Bandwidth 41.6 GB/s 47.68 GB/s
ECC Support No Yes

Misc

Official Site Intel Core i5 10400F official page AMD Ryzen 5 3600 official page
PCI Express Version 3.0 4.0
PCI Express Lanes 16 16

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
498 (23.2%)
1647 (76.8%)
Total votes: 2145

Competitors

1. AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs Apple M3
2. AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs Apple M1
3. AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs AMD Ryzen 5 5600
4. AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs AMD Ryzen 5 5500 (5)
5. AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs AMD Ryzen 5 7600
6. AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs Intel Core i3 12100F (1)
7. Intel Core i5 10400F vs Intel Core i3 12100F
8. Intel Core i5 10400F vs Intel Core i5 12400F
9. Intel Core i5 10400F vs AMD Ryzen 5 5500
Compare other CPUs (460+)

Comments

So which CPU will you choose: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 or Intel Core i5 10400F?
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Andromeda April 28, 2021 at 08:59 AM
If you just want gaming, you can go for intel because that performs overall 7 to 10% better in some games.And if you want editing, multitasking you have to go for amd because I suggest that
+128 Reply
Avatar
palonko March 5, 2021 at 04:30 PM
yeah, where i live (central europe) there is a 65 dollar price difference between the two, and the 3600 doesnt come with a cooler either for some reason, also the motherboards are roughly the same price here
+20 Reply
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Ash Hilton January 2, 2021 at 06:05 PM
I would naturally choose the intel core i5 10400f...not by any means because of its performance but rather its price.
+66 Reply
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Shadowdead00 January 22, 2021 at 01:17 PM
What are you talking about, it is clearly shown that i5 10400f has low performance than ryzen 5 3600
+55 Reply
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Lucky January 31, 2021 at 05:27 PM
People buy i5 10400f only considering price difference about amd and intel but they don't that they have to pay extra price for the CPU cooler and mother board 🀦🀦plz check overall build cost and choose don't blindly see individual parts price and buy
+48 Reply
Avatar
Aman February 11, 2021 at 01:35 AM
Shadowdead00, Yes that's true no one can make it false statement
+9 Reply
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Cytro October 7, 2021 at 11:21 AM
Lucky, What if you already have the cooler
+1 Reply
Avatar
Rathstar December 9, 2021 at 04:57 PM
Cytro, In the UK (your local market may vary). The Intel CPU is cheaper and comes with a cooler that will keep it cool enough while gaming. Both have cheap motherboards but I would say the AMD boards are cheaper for the same quality (can't go wrong with some of the current prices for a B450 Tomahawk). Gaming scores are very close, so I would go with Intel. However, another consideration would be the 2700X, only just behind in single-core than these two but beats them for multi-core.
+5 Reply
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