Home > CPU Comparison > Core i9 9900K or Ryzen 9 9950X: what's better?

Intel Core i9 9900K vs AMD Ryzen 9 9950X

41 out of 100
Intel Core i9 9900K
VS
92 out of 100
AMD Ryzen 9 9950X
Intel Core i9 9900K
AMD Ryzen 9 9950X

We compared two desktop CPUs: the 3.6 GHz Intel Core i9 9900K with 8-cores against the 4.3 GHz AMD Ryzen 9 9950X with 16-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

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
11.7
(Bad)
Value Index
53.8
(Average)

Key Differences

What are the key differences between 9950X and 9900K
Advantages of AMD Ryzen 9 9950X
  • Has 48 MB larger L3 cache size, helping fully utilize a high-end GPU in gaming
  • Newer - released 5 years and 9 months later
  • More modern manufacturing process – 4 versus 14 nanometers
  • Around 48 GB/s (115%) higher theoretical memory bandwidth
  • 2.1x faster in a single-core Geekbench v6 test - 3418 vs 1621 points
  • Has 8 more physical cores
  • Newer PCI Express version – 5.0
  • Supports up to 192 GB DDR5-5600 RAM
  • 14% higher Turbo Boost frequency (5.7 GHz vs 5 GHz)

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks
CPU:
Core i9 9900K
vs
Ryzen 9 9950X

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
Core i9 9900K
706
Ryzen 9 9950X +229%
2320
Cinebench 2026 (Single) - 724
Cinebench 2026 (Multi) - 7630
Cinebench Scores (#9th place)
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 i9 9900K
1621
Ryzen 9 9950X +111%
3418
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
Core i9 9900K
8151
Ryzen 9 9950X +167%
21758
File compression 545.7 MB/sec 1710 MB/sec
Clang compilation 67.7 Klines/sec 226 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 175.1 pages/sec 391.9 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 275.6 Mpixels/sec 586.8 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 159 pages/sec 351.6 pages/sec
Background blur 40.4 images/sec 84.3 images/sec
Photo processing 68.6 images/sec 144.4 images/sec
Ray tracing 14.5 Mpixels/sec 55.7 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] – 610 & 1 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Core i9 9900K
2911
Ryzen 9 9950X +62%
4728
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Core i9 9900K
18059
Ryzen 9 9950X +264%
65714
Integer math 66.1 GOps/sec 241.5 GOps/sec
Floating point math 41 GOps/sec 158.5 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 46M Primes/sec 343M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 36.1M Strings/sec 93.7M Strings/sec
Data encryption 6.3 GBytes/sec 44.2 GBytes/sec
Data compression 282.6 MBytes/sec 891.3 MBytes/sec
Physics 929 Frames/sec 3254 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 19B Matrices/sec 71.2B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] – 17571 & 6583 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
Core i9 9900K
178.22
Ryzen 9 9950X +236%
598.37

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 7.4 PPW 13.6 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 85.8 PPW 128 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 190.1 PPW 386.6 PPW
Blender / Watt 1.88 PPW 3.52 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 i9 9900K
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-01-01 (Mr Scare)Cinebench 202479 / 662
πŸ“˜ 2025-08-09 (EndOfTheWorld77)Cinebench 202478 / 591
πŸ“˜ 2024-03-28 (Gribbstar)Cinebench 202479 / 706
Add View all (3)
AMD Ryzen 9 9950X
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-07-05 (greenmonalisa)Cinebench 2024136 / 2307
πŸ“˜ 2026-06-25 (Malanore)Cinebench 2026724 / 7630
πŸ“˜ 2026-04-20 -> TukiGeekBench3607 / 23374
πŸ“˜ 2026-02-07 (jimmygeneris)Cinebench 2024136 / 2114
πŸ“˜ 2026-01-01 (Capt Jack Swallows)Cinebench 2024136 / 2162
Add View all (34)

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core i9 9900K and AMD Ryzen 9 9950X

General

Vendor Intel Amd
Released October 8, 2018 June 3, 2024
Type Desktop Desktop
Instruction Set x86-64 x86-64
Codename Coffee Lake Zen 5 (Granite Ridge)
Model number i9-9900K 9950X
Integrated GPU UHD Graphics 630 Radeon Graphics
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 9 3900X - Intel Core i9 14900K
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 9 285K -

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 8 16
P-Threads 16 32
Base Frequency (P) 3.6 GHz 4.3 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 5 GHz 5.7 GHz
Total
Total Cores 8 16
Total Threads 16 32
Bus Frequency 100 MHz 100 MHz
Multiplier 36x 43x
Bus Bandwidth 8 GT/s -
L1 Cache 64K (per core) 80K (per core)
L2 Cache 256K (per core) 1MB (per core)
L3 Cache 16MB (shared) 64MB (shared)
Unlocked Multiplier Yes Yes

Package

Fabrication Process 14 nm 4 nm
TDP (PL1) 95 W 170 W
Max. Boost TDP (PL2) - 230 W
Socket LGA-1151 AM5
Peak Temperature 100Β°C 95Β°C
Desktop CPU ranking (145th and 6th place)

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Intel UHD Graphics 630 Radeon Graphics
GPU Base Clock 350 MHz -
GPU Boost Clock 1200 MHz 2200 MHz
Shading Units 192 -
TMUs 24 -
ROPs 3 -
Execution Units 24 -
TGP 15 W -
iGPU FLOPS
Core i9 9900K
0.5 TFLOPS
Ryzen 9 9950X
n/a
See: Intel UHD Graphics 630 benchmarks

Memory Support

Memory Types - DDR4-2666 - DDR5-5600
Max. Memory Size 128 GB 192 GB
Memory Channels 2 2
Max. Memory Bandwidth 41.6 GB/s 89.6 GB/s
ECC Support No Yes

Misc

Official Site Intel Core i9 9900K official page AMD Ryzen 9 9950X official page
PCI Express Version 3.0 5.0
PCI Express Lanes 16 28

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
0 (0%)
7 (100%)
Total votes: 7

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6. AMD Ryzen 9 9950X vs Intel Core i9 14900KS (11)
7. AMD Ryzen 9 9950X vs AMD Ryzen 9 7950X (5)
8. AMD Ryzen 9 9950X vs AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D (1)
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10. AMD Ryzen 9 9950X vs AMD Ryzen 9 9900X
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Comments

So which CPU will you choose: AMD Ryzen 9 9950X or Intel Core i9 9900K?
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