Home > CPU Comparison > Core Ultra 5 125U or Ryzen 5 8540U: what's better?

Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs AMD Ryzen 5 8540U

48 out of 100
Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
VS
53 out of 100
AMD Ryzen 5 8540U
Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
AMD Ryzen 5 8540U

We compared two laptop CPUs: the 1.3 GHz Intel Core Ultra 5 125U with 12-cores against the 3.7 GHz AMD Ryzen 5 8540U with 6-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
Integrated Graphics
iGPU capabilities for gaming and 3D-intensive tasks
NanoReview Final Score
Choose your main usage scenario to recalculate the Final Score and see which CPU suits your needs.
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Key Differences

What are the key differences between 8540U and 125U
Advantages of Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
  • Has 6 more physical cores
  • More powerful Arc Graphics (4-Cores) integrated graphics: 1.9 vs 1.4 TFLOPS
  • More than 10° C higher critical temperature
Advantages of AMD Ryzen 5 8540U
  • Supports up to 256 GB DDR5-5600 RAM
  • More modern manufacturing process – 4 versus 7 nanometers
  • Has 4 MB larger L3 cache size
  • 16% faster in a single-core Geekbench v6 test - 2447 vs 2113 points
  • 14% higher Turbo Boost frequency (4.9 GHz vs 4.3 GHz)

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks
CPU:
Core Ultra 5 125U
vs
Ryzen 5 8540U

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
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)
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
File compression 958.1 MB/sec 1010 MB/sec
Clang compilation 65.6 Klines/sec 62.7 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 223.8 pages/sec 179.9 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 243.9 Mpixels/sec 226.9 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 213.2 pages/sec 247.2 pages/sec
Background blur 40.3 images/sec 42.7 images/sec
Photo processing 93.4 images/sec 74.8 images/sec
Ray tracing 13.8 Mpixels/sec 13.7 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] – 18 & 3 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Integer math 55.8 GOps/sec 57.3 GOps/sec
Floating point math 40.2 GOps/sec 35 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 64M Primes/sec 68M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 20.8M Strings/sec 24.7M Strings/sec
Data encryption 11.7 GBytes/sec 12.2 GBytes/sec
Data compression 188.5 MBytes/sec 207.6 MBytes/sec
Physics 1063 Frames/sec 997 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 10.7B Matrices/sec 15B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] – 2202 & 134 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
Core Ultra 5 125U
109.62
Ryzen 5 8540U +13%
123.6

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 41.1 PPW 18.9 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 761.3 PPW 305.8 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 1396.5 PPW 609.6 PPW
Blender / Watt 9.14 PPW 4.12 PPW
These are rough calculations, as most CPUs surpass PL1 TDP wattage even in multicore workloads.

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core Ultra 5 125U and AMD Ryzen 5 8540U

General

Vendor Intel Amd
Released December 14, 2023 December 6, 2023
Type Laptop Laptop
Instruction Set x86-64 x86-64
Codename Meteor Lake Zen 4 (Hawk Point)
Model number 125U -
Integrated GPU Arc Graphics (4-Cores) Radeon 740M
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 5 8540U - Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 5 225U - AMD Ryzen 5 230
Intel CPU rating (#169th place)
AMD Ryzen CPU ranking (#94th place)

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 2 2
P-Threads 4 4
Base Frequency (P) 1.3 GHz 3.7 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 4.3 GHz 4.9 GHz
Efficient Cores
E-Cores 10 4
E-Threads 10 8
Base Frequency (E) 0.8 GHz 3 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (E) 3.6 GHz 3.7 GHz
Total
Total Cores 12 6
Total Threads 14 12
Bus Frequency 100 MHz 100 MHz
Multiplier 13x 37x
L1 Cache 112K (per core) 64K (per core)
L2 Cache 2MB (per core) 1MB (per core)
L3 Cache 12MB (shared) 16MB (shared)
Unlocked Multiplier No No

Package

Transistors - 20.9 billions
Fabrication Process 7 nm 4 nm
TDP (PL1) 12 W 15-30 W (configurable)
Max. Boost TDP (PL2) 57 W -
Socket FCBGA-2049 FP7
Peak Temperature 110°C 100°C

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Arc Graphics (4-Cores) Radeon 740M
GPU Base Clock 300 MHz 800 MHz
GPU Boost Clock 1850 MHz 2800 MHz
Shading Units 512 256
TMUs 32 16
ROPs 16 8
Execution Units 64 4
TGP 14 W 15 W
iGPU FLOPS
Core Ultra 5 125U +36%
1.9 TFLOPS
Ryzen 5 8540U
1.4 TFLOPS
More info: Radeon 740M compared to Arc iGPU (4-Cores)

Memory Support

Memory Types - LPDDR5-7467
- LPDDR5x-7467
- DDR5-5600		 - DDR5-5600
- LPDDR5x-7500
Max. Memory Size 96 GB 256 GB
Memory Channels 2 2
Max. Memory Bandwidth 89.6 GB/s -
ECC Support No No

Misc

Official Site Intel Core Ultra 5 125U official page AMD Ryzen 5 8540U official page
PCI Express Version 4.0 4.0
PCI Express Lanes 20 14

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
14 (26.4%)
39 (73.6%)
Total votes: 53

Competitors

1. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core i5 1235U
2. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core i7 1355U
3. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core i5 1335U (1)
4. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core Ultra 7 155U (5)
5. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core Ultra 5 125H
6. AMD Ryzen 5 8540U vs AMD Ryzen 5 7540U
7. AMD Ryzen 5 8540U vs Intel Core i7 1355U
8. AMD Ryzen 5 8540U vs Intel Core i5 1335U
9. AMD Ryzen 5 8540U vs AMD Ryzen 7 8840U
10. AMD Ryzen 5 8540U vs AMD Ryzen 7 7840U
Compare other CPUs (460+)

Comments

So which CPU will you choose: AMD Ryzen 5 8540U or Intel Core Ultra 5 125U?
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