Home > CPU Comparisons > Core i9 12900K or Core i7 12700K: what's better?

Intel Core i9 12900K vs i7 12700K

Intel Core i9 12900K
VS
Intel Core i7 12700K
Intel Core i9 12900K
Intel Core i7 12700K

We compared two desktop CPUs: the 3,2 GHz Intel Core i9 12900K with 16-cores against the 3.6 GHz i7 12700K with 12-cores. 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 (2)

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 electricity consumption
NanoReview Final Score
Generic CPU rating

Key Differences

What are the key differences between 12700K and 12900K
Advantages of Intel Core i9 12900K
  • Has 4 more physical cores
  • Has 5120 KB larger L3 cache size
  • 4% higher Turbo Boost frequency (5.1 GHz vs 4.9 GHz)

Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs in benchmarks
Cinebench R23 (Single-Core)
Cinebench R23 (Multi-Core)
Core i9 12900K +19%
27090
Core i7 12700K
22860
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Core i9 12900K +19%
41300
Core i7 12700K
34598
Geekbench 5 (Single-Core)
Geekbench 5 (Multi-Core)
Core i9 12900K +10%
17028
Core i7 12700K
15499
Submit your Cinebench R23 result

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core i9 12900K and i7 12700K

General

Vendor Intel Intel
Released October 27, 2021 October 27, 2021
Type Desktop Desktop
instruction set x86-64 x86-64
Codename Alder Lake Alder Lake
Model number i9-12900K i7-12700K
Integrated GPU UHD Graphics 770 UHD Graphics 770

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 8 8
P-Threads 16 16
Base Frequency (P) 3,2 GHz 3.6 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 5.1 GHz 4.9 GHz
Efficient Cores
E-Cores 8 4
E-Threads 8 4
Base Frequency (E) 2.4 GHz 2.7 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (E) 3.9 GHz 3.8 GHz
Total
Total Cores 16 12
Total Threads 24 20
Bus Frequency 100 MHz 100 MHz
Multiplier 32x 36x
L1 Cache 64K (per core) 80K (per core)
L2 Cache 14MB (shared) 12MB (shared)
L3 Cache 30MB (shared) 25MB (shared)
Unlocked Multiplier Yes Yes

Package

Fabrication process 10 nm 10 nm
Socket LGA-1700 LGA-1700
TDP 125 W 125 W
Max. Boost TDP - 190 W
Peak temperature 100°C 100°C

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Intel UHD Graphics 770 Intel UHD Graphics 770
GPU Base Clock 300 MHz 300 MHz
GPU Boost Clock 1550 MHz 1500 MHz
Shading Units 256 256
TMUs 16 16
ROPs 8 8
Execution Units 32 32
TGP 15 W 15 W
iGPU FLOPS
Core i9 12900K
0.78 TFLOPS
Core i7 12700K
0.78 TFLOPS

Memory Support

Memory types DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200 DDR5-4800, DDR4-3200
Memory Size 128 GB 128 GB
Max. Memory Channels 2 2
Max. Memory Bandwidth 76.8 GB/s 76.8 GB/s
ECC Support Yes Yes

Misc

Official site Intel Core i9 12900K official page Intel Core i7 12700K official page
PCI Express Version 5.0 5.0
PCI Express Lanes 20 20

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
221 (25.9%)
633 (74.1%)
Total votes: 854

Сompetitors

1. Core i9 12900K or Ryzen 7 7800X3D
2. Core i9 12900K or Core i7 13700K
3. Core i9 12900K or Core i9 13900K
4. Core i9 12900K or Core i5 13600K
5. Core i7 12700K or Ryzen 7 7800X3D
6. Core i7 12700K or Core i7 13700K
7. Core i7 12700K or Core i5 13600K
8. Core i7 12700K or Core i7 12700F
9. Core i7 12700K or Core i7 12700KF
10. Core i7 12700K or M2 Pro
Compare other CPUs (540+)

Comments

So which CPU will you choose: Intel Core i7 12700K or i9 12900K?
Avatar
Savitarax 20 January 2022 03:36
While yes the 12900k may have seemingly much higher core counts. This is misleading to the vast majority of gamers and desktop users. Because the extra cores are little cores. Which have been seen to hurt gaming performance when enabled and disabling them increases performance. This is due to the little cores not being optimized yet for most games and windows. So it's also unlocking the extra cache that was to be diverted to the little cores and instead the big cores get the extra cache. So in reality. The extra 5MB of cache can easily be overcome by disabling the 4 scores and only having 8 P cores. This is only for the meantime and this result may change. But for now. Given the info I just described. The 12700k is a MUCH MUCH better option for 90% of users. If you are a high-end desktop workstation user who needs lots of multithreaded high core counts CPUs. You would be better off getting a 5950x instead since it has 16 big cores. So it will work better with heavy workloads.
+54 Reply
Avatar
Hiii 22 November 2021 06:33
i7 is the better option since it's cheaper and there's nothing from the competition that comes near it.
+27 Reply
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