Intel Core i3-12100 vs Intel Core i5-12600K

Core i3-12100 vs Core i5-12600K specs and performance

In our benchmarks, the Core i5-12600K beats the Core i3-12100 in overall performance. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core i3-12100 in all gaming tests too.

With info from our database, we find that the Core i5-12600K has significantly more cores with 10 cores whereas the Core i3-12100 has 4 cores. It also has more threads than the Core i3-12100. With our hardware info, we find that the Core i5-12600K has a slightly higher clock speed than the Core i3-12100. Also, the Core i5-12600K has a slightly higher turbo speed. A Core i3-12100 CPU outputs less heat than a Core i5-12600K CPU because of its significantly 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.