Intel Core i3-12100F vs Intel Core i5-12500

Core i3-12100F vs Core i5-12500 comparison

In our benchmarks, the Core i5-12500 beats the Core i3-12100F in overall performance. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core i3-12100F in all gaming tests too.

With info from our database, we find that the Core i5-12500 has significantly more cores with 6 cores whereas the Core i3-12100F has 4 cores. It also has more threads than the Core i3-12100F. A Core i3-12100F 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 i3-12100F has more threads than cores. Each physical core is split into multiple threads.