Intel Core i3-12100 vs Intel Core i5-12500

Compare Intel 12th Generation Core i3 4 core CPU vs Intel 12th Generation Core i5 6 core processor, specs and benchmark score. Which is the better CPU for gaming?

Benchmark Score
Other Benchmarks
Specifications
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Intel Core i5-12500

Price

The cheapest price from our partner retailers

$ 128.59

$ 143.63 significantly less expensive

$ 272.22

Benchmark Score

Overall Score

A combined score of all workloads

5115 points

7166 points

40% slightly better overall score

Gaming Score

The raw gaming performance with a fast GPU

8339 points

9976 points

19% slightly better gaming score

Multitasking Score

Performance in workloads using up to 8 cores

4166 points

6301 points

51% significantly better multitasking score

Heavy Workload Score

Performance in workloads using up to 16 cores

4001 points

6099 points

52% significantly better heavy workload score

Free CPU Benchmark

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Other Benchmarks

3DMark Physics score

Physics simulation benchmark

4034 points

6075 points

50% significantly higher 3DMark Physics score

Blender score

Cycles Render (Samples per minute)

111.80 points

170.78 points

52% significantly higher Blender score

Geekbench 5 (multi) score

Multi threaded benchmark

6822 points

9112 points

33% slightly higher Geekbench 5 (multi) score

Geekbench 5 (single) score

Single threaded benchmark

2105 points

2182 points

3% slightly higher Geekbench 5 (single) score

Geekbench 6 (multi) score

Multi threaded benchmark

6766 points

9032 points

33% slightly higher Geekbench 6 (multi) score

Geekbench 6 (single) score

Single threaded benchmark

2147 points

2320 points

8% slightly higher Geekbench 6 (single) score

Specifications

Cores

Number of physical processing units

49% significantly more cores

Threads

Number of logical processing units

49% significantly more threads

Turbo Speed

Higher frequency used for heavy workloads

4.3 GHz

4.6 GHz

6% slightly higher turbo speed

TDP

Thermal Design Power: Measure of heat generated by the CPU

60 W

8% slightly lower TDP

65 W

PCIe Lanes

Number of physical connections between the CPU and expansion slots

Identical

Memory Channels

Lanes for simultaneous memory access

Identical

Supported Memory

Maximum amount of RAM supported by this CPU

128 GiB

Identical

128 GiB

L1 Cache

Smallest embedded memory, but the fastest

320 KiB

480 KiB

49% significantly more L1 cache

L3 Cache

General memory pool for all cores

12 MiB

18 MiB

49% significantly more L3 cache

Other details

Rank

Ranking in the hardwareDB database

337th of 1,089

182nd of 1,089

Family

The product line

12th Generation Core i3

12th Generation Core i5

Release date

The official date of release of this chip

2022 February

Memory Type

The type of memory used by this chip

DDR5-4800

Is Unlocked

Can this CPU can be overclocked

Supports ECC memory

Does this CPU support error correcting memory

Yes

Core i3-12100 vs Core i5-12500 specs and performance

Our benchmark analysis concludes that the Core i5-12500 performs better than the Core i3-12100. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core i3-12100 in all gaming tests too.

In terms of the number of cores of each of these CPUs, the Core i5-12500 has significantly more cores than the Core i3-12100. Indeed, the Core i5-12500 has 6 cores compared to 4 cores found in the Core i3-12100. It also has more threads than the Core i3-12100. A Core i3-12100 CPU outputs less heat than a Core i5-12500 CPU because of its slightly lower TDP. This measures the amount of heat they output and can be used to estimate power consumption.

Most CPUs have more threads than cores. This technology, colloquially called hyperthreading, improves performance by splitting a core into multiple virtual ones. This provides more efficient utilisation of a core. Indeed, the Core i3-12100 has more threads than cores. Each physical core is split into multiple threads.