Intel Core i5-12600K: specs and benchmarks

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Combined performance score

Summary

Intel started Core i5-12600K sales 4 November 2021 at a recommended price of $289. This is an Alder Lake-S architecture desktop processor primarily aimed at office systems. It has 10 cores and 16 threads, and is based on Intel 7 manufacturing technology, with a max turbo frequency of 4900 MHz and an unlocked multiplier.

Compatibility-wise, this is FCLGA1700 processor with a TDP of 125 Watt and a maximum temperature of 72 °C. It supports DDR4, DDR5 memory.

It provides poor benchmark performance at 18.06% of a leader's which is AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7995WX.

Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7995WXRyzen ThreadripperPRO 7995WX
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General info

Core i5-12600K processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and pricing.

Place in performance ranking294
Place by popularity70
Value for money59.96
Market segmentDesktop processor
SeriesIntel Core i5
Architecture codenameAlder Lake-S (2022)
Release date4 November 2021 (2 years old)
Launch price (MSRP)$289of 305 (Core i7-870)
Current price$260 (0.9x MSRP)of 17802 (Threadripper PRO 7995WX)
Value for money

Performance per price, higher is better.

Technical specs

Basic microprocessor parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base frequency and turbo boost clock, lithography, cache size and multiplier lock state. These parameters can generally indicate CPU performance, but to be more precise you have to review its test results.

Physical cores10 (Deca-Core)
Threads16
Base clock speed3.7 GHzof 4.7 (FX-9590)
Boost clock speed4.9 GHzof 6.2 (Core i9-14900KS)
L1 cache80K (per core)of 7475.2 (Apple M2 Pro 10-Core)
L2 cache1.25 MB (per core)of 36 (Apple M2 Max)
L3 cache20 MB (shared)of 768 (EPYC 7373X)
Chip lithographyIntel 7 nmof 3 (Apple M3 Max 16-Core)
Die size215.25 mm220.5 mm × 10.5 mm
Maximum core temperature100 °Cof 110 (Atom x7-E3950)
Maximum case temperature (TCase)72 °Cof 105 (Core i7-5950HQ)
64 bit support+
Windows 11 compatibility+
Unlocked multiplierYes

Compatibility

Information on Core i5-12600K compatibility with other computer components and devices: motherboard (look for socket type), power supply unit (look for power consumption) etc. Useful when planning a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. Note that power consumption of some processors can well exceed their nominal TDP, even without overclocking. Some can even double their declared thermals given that the motherboard allows to tune the CPU power parameters.

Number of CPUs in a configuration1of 8 (Opteron 842)
SocketFCLGA1700
Power consumption (TDP)125 Wattof 400 (Xeon Platinum 9282)

Technologies and extensions

Technological capabilities and additional instructions supported by Core i5-12600K. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.

Instruction set extensionsIntel® SSE4.1, Intel® SSE4.2, Intel® AVX2
AES-NI+
FMA+
AVX+
vPro+
Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST)+
Speed Shift+
Turbo Boost Technology2.0
Hyper-Threading Technology+
Idle States+
Thermal Monitoring+
SIPP+
Turbo Boost Max 3.0-
StatusLaunched

Security technologies

Processor technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.

TXT+
EDB+
Secure Key+
OS Guard+

Virtualization technologies

Supported virtual machine optimization technologies. Some are specific to Intel only, some to AMD.

VT-d+
VT-x+
EPT+

Memory specs

Types, maximum amount and channel number of RAM supported by Core i5-12600K's memory controller. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequency may be supported.

Supported memory typesDDR4, DDR5of 5600 (Ryzen 9 7940HS)
Maximum memory size128 GBof 786 (Xeon E5-2670 v3)
Max memory channels2of 12 (Xeon Platinum 9221)
Maximum memory bandwidth76.8 GB/sof 460.8 (EPYC 9124)
ECC memory support+

Graphics specifications

General parameters of a GPU integrated into Core i5-12600K.

Integrated graphics cardIntel UHD Graphics 770
Quick Sync Video+
Clear Video HD+
Graphics max frequency1.45 GHz
Execution Units32

Graphics interfaces

Available interfaces and connections of Core i5-12600K's integrated GPU.

Number of displays supported4

Graphics image quality

Maximum display resolutions supported by Core i5-12600K's integrated GPU, including resolutions over different interfaces.

Max resolution over HDMI 1.44096 x 2160 @ 60Hz
Max resolution over eDP5120 x 3200 @ 120Hz
Max resolution over DisplayPort7680 x 4320 @ 60Hz

Graphics API support

APIs supported by Core i5-12600K's integrated GPU, sometimes API versions are included.

DirectX12
OpenGL4.5

Peripherals

Specifications and connection types of supported peripherals.

PCIe version5.0 and 4.0
PCI Express lanes20of 128 (EPYC 7551P)

Benchmark performance

Single-core and multi-core benchmark results of Core i5-12600K. Overall benchmark performance is measured in points in 0-100 range, higher is better.


Combined synthetic benchmark score

This is our combined benchmark performance rating. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.

i5-12600K 18.06

Passmark

Passmark CPU Mark is a widespread benchmark, consisting of 8 different types of workload, including integer and floating point math, extended instructions, compression, encryption and physics calculation. There is also one separate single-threaded scenario measuring single-core performance.

Benchmark coverage: 68%

i5-12600K 27745

GeekBench 5 Single-Core

GeekBench 5 Single-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses only a single CPU core.

Benchmark coverage: 42%

i5-12600K 2449

GeekBench 5 Multi-Core

GeekBench 5 Multi-Core is a cross-platform application developed in the form of CPU tests that independently recreate certain real-world tasks with which to accurately measure performance. This version uses all available CPU cores.

Benchmark coverage: 42%

i5-12600K 11796

Cinebench 10 32-bit single-core

Cinebench R10 is an ancient ray tracing benchmark for processors by Maxon, authors of Cinema 4D. Its single core version uses just one CPU thread to render a futuristic looking motorcycle.

Benchmark coverage: 20%

i5-12600K 9381

Cinebench 10 32-bit multi-core

Cinebench Release 10 Multi Core is a variant of Cinebench R10 using all the processor threads. Possible number of threads is limited by 16 in this version.

Benchmark coverage: 19%

i5-12600K 55462

3DMark06 CPU

3DMark06 is a discontinued DirectX 9 benchmark suite from Futuremark. Its CPU part contains two scenarios, one dedicated to artificial intelligence pathfinding, another to game physics using PhysX package.

Benchmark coverage: 19%

i5-12600K 15722

Cinebench 11.5 64-bit multi-core

Cinebench Release 11.5 Multi Core is a variant of Cinebench R11.5 which uses all the processor threads. A maximum of 64 threads is supported in this version.

Benchmark coverage: 17%

i5-12600K 30

Cinebench 15 64-bit multi-core

Cinebench Release 15 Multi Core is a variant of Cinebench R15 which uses all the processor threads.

Benchmark coverage: 15%

i5-12600K 2555

Cinebench 15 64-bit single-core

Cinebench R15 (standing for Release 15) is a benchmark made by Maxon, authors of Cinema 4D. It was superseded by later versions of Cinebench, which use more modern variants of Cinema 4D engine. The Single Core version (sometimes called Single-Thread) only uses a single processor thread to render a room full of reflective spheres and light sources.

Benchmark coverage: 15%

i5-12600K 275

Cinebench 11.5 64-bit single-core

Cinebench R11.5 is an old benchmark by Maxon, authors of Cinema 4D. It was superseded by later versions of Cinebench, which use more modern variants of Cinema 4D engine. The Single Core version loads a single thread with ray tracing to render a glossy room full of crystal spheres and light sources.

Benchmark coverage: 14%

i5-12600K 3.31

TrueCrypt AES

TrueCrypt is a discontinued piece of software that was widely used for on-the-fly-encryption of disk partitions, now superseded by VeraCrypt. It contains several embedded performance tests, one of them being TrueCrypt AES, which measures data encryption speed using AES algorithm. Result is encryption speed in gigabytes per second.

Benchmark coverage: 13%

i5-12600K 12.8

WinRAR 4.0

WinRAR 4.0 is an outdated version of a popular file archiver. It contains an internal speed test, using 'Best' setting of RAR compression on large chunks of randomly generated data. Its results are measured in kilobytes per second.

Benchmark coverage: 13%

i5-12600K 6239

x264 encoding pass 1

x264 version 4.0 is a video encoding benchmark uses MPEG 4 x264 compression method to compress a sample HD (720p) video. Pass 1 is a faster variant that produces a constant bit rate output file. Its result is measured in frames per second, which means how many frames of the source video file were encoded per second.  

Benchmark coverage: 13%

i5-12600K 334

x264 encoding pass 2

x264 Pass 2 is a slower variant of x264 video compression that produces a variable bit rate output file, which results in better quality since the higher bit rate is used when it is needed more. Benchmark result is still measured in frames per second.  

Benchmark coverage: 13%

i5-12600K 148

Gaming performance

Relative perfomance

Overall Core i5-12600K performance compared to nearest competitors among desktop CPUs.


AMD equivalent

According to our data, the closest AMD alternative to Core i5-12600K is Ryzen Threadripper 1950X, which is nearly equal in speed and lower by 1 position in our ranking.

Ryzen Threadripper 1950XRyzen Threadripper1950X
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Here are some closest AMD rivals to Core i5-12600K:

Similar processors

Here is our recommendation of several processors that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.

i9-10940XCore i910940X
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i7-13700TCore i713700T
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Ryzen 7 5800XRyzen 75800X
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i5-13500ECore i513500E
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i5-12600KFCore i512600KF
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Ryzen 5 7600Ryzen 57600
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Recommended GPUs

People consider these graphics cards to be good for Core i5-12600K, according to our PC configuration statistics.

These are the fastest graphics cards for Core i5-12600K in our user configuration statistics. There is a total of 9255 configurations based on Core i5-12600K in our database.

RTX 4090 GeForce RTX 4090
1.7% (157/9255)
RTX 4080 GeForce RTX 4080
0.5% (49/9255)
RTX 4070 Ti GeForce RTX 4070 Ti
2% (185/9255)
RX 7900 XTX Radeon RX 7900 XTX
0.2% (15/9255)
RTX 3090 Ti GeForce RTX 3090 Ti
1.3% (116/9255)
RX 7900 XT Radeon RX 7900 XT
0.1% (10/9255)
RX 6950 XT Radeon RX 6950 XT
0.1% (10/9255)

User ratings: view and submit

Here is the rating given to the reviewed processor by our users. Let others know your opinion by rating it yourself.


3.9 2209 votes

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