Intel Core Ultra 9 285K

Written analysis

Intel Core Ultra 9 285K at a glance

The Intel Core Ultra 9 285K is based on the Arrow Lake-S architecture and is manufactured using the 3 nm process at TSMC. It uses the LGA 1851 socket with Z890, B860, W880, Q870, H810 chipsets, PCIe Gen 5, 20 Lanes (CPU only), and DDR5 memory up to 6400 MT/s across Dual-channel memory. This is a hybrid design with 8 performance cores at 3.70–5.70 GHz and 16 efficiency cores at 3.20–4.60 GHz, for 24 threads. Cache is 3072 kB L2 and 36 MB L3.

This is a Desktop processor using consumer memory and expansion standards. Its workload suitability is better described by the measured application and gaming scores below than by core count alone.

Base TDP is 125 W and maximum package power is 250 W. Sustained all-core loads require top-tier cooling and strong case airflow; check motherboard power limits before sizing the cooler.

Integrated graphics: Arc Xe-LPG Graphics 64EU with 4 GPU cores at 0.30–2.00 GHz. That is enough for display output, desktop work, and lighter games without a discrete GPU.

Best fit: High-end productivity and mixed creation workloads, with gaming capability determined by the score below.

Application performance

Intel Core Ultra 9 285K is a high-end CPU, at 87.17% of the dataset’s best application performance. It is built for demanding creation and compute work.

Application value is balanced at 49.3 performance per dollar.

Gaming performance

Intel Core Ultra 9 285K is a strong gaming CPU, at 81.81% of the dataset’s best 1080p CPU-limited gaming. At higher resolutions the GPU usually becomes the limit first.

Gaming value is 30.4 performance per dollar. That is expected for a high-end gaming chip.