AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D review - a barnstorming gaming CPU, if you can afford it

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D should really be worrying Intel. I've just been putting it through its paces for this review, and I'm absolutely blown away by it. There really isn't any desktop CPU work this chip can't do, and it seemingly laughs at the competition while it's doing it. Gaming? Big tick. Heavily multi-threaded productivity work? Massive tick. Heck, even its operating temperature and power draw are surprisingly low. The only factor counting against it is its sky-high price, but even that isn't unreasonable for the performance on offer.

That doesn't mean the latest flagship AMD CPU is the best chip for everyone, though. If your top priority is gaming, the acclaimed AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D offers the same performance for a lower price, and, let's face it, this eight-core CPU covers the vast majority of people's multi-threading needs as well. But if you do a lot of parallel number crunching, such as video encoding or 3D rendering, and you also want the best gaming performance, the 9950X3D is now going onto our best gaming CPU guide as the chip that can do it all.

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Specs

The specs of the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D make for a curious hybrid - it's not simply two Ryzen 7 9800X3Ds smooshed together in one package. Instead, it has one eight-core chiplet die (CCD) with a 64MB slice of AMD's 3D V-cache sat underneath it, and one eight-core CCD that has no extra cache at all - just the standard 32MB of L3 cache you usually get with an eight-core AMD Zen 5 CPU. This means that only eight of the cores have direct access to the 3D V-cache, but that shouldn't be a big deal, as the vast majority of games don't use more than eight cores anyway.

Meanwhile, the lack of 3D V-cache on the other eight cores gives AMD some thermal headroom to significantly increase their peak clock speed. This non-X3D chiplet can boost to up to 5.7GHz, giving it a 500MHz clock speed benefit over a pure X3D CPU such as the Ryzen 7 9800X3D. The idea is that this CPU then provides the best of both worlds - eight cores with 3D V-cache for gaming, and the ability to engage an extra eight cores with a higher clock speed for applications.

There are all sorts of rumors about AMD making a pure X3D 16-core gaming CPU, where all 16 cores have access to the 3D V-cache chip, as each eight-core chiplet has a 3D V-cache chip on it, making for a huge 192MB total of L3 cache. However, it's worth noting that the benefits of this chip would be limited - the resulting lower clock speed would hurt multi-threaded performance, and there would be limited gains in games, as so few games use more than eight cores. I'd argue that AMD has got the balance right with this chip, as we'll see from the benchmarks later.

Other points of note in the specs list are the 32 threads, as all 16 of this Zen 5 CPU's cores have Simultaneous Multithreading (SMT) tech enabled, unlike Intel's latest Arrow Lake chips. Meanwhile, the 170W thermal design power (TDP) is significantly higher than the 150W of the 9800X3D, thanks to those extra eight cores with their higher boost clock.

As such, you'll need a decent cooler to keep this CPU under control. You can check out our guide to buying the best CPU cooler to find the best one for your needs - I'd recommend at least a 240mm AIO cooler for this chip, and a 360mm model will be even better.

How we test

I've put the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D through our usual benchmark suite, using an MSI X870E Carbon WiFi test motherboard, and I've also retested all the other current CPUs we've got in the PCGamesN lab, in order to make sure the comparison results are up to date. All the CPU test rigs use the same 32GB of (2 x 16GB) G.Skill TridentZ 5 Neo RGB 6,000MHz, CL28 RAM, as well as a 2TB WD Black SN850X SSD, Corsair H100x 240mm AIO cooler, Corsair RM1000x Shift PSU, and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 Founders Edition graphics card.

All our tests were conducted using Windows 11 24H2, with the motherboard flashed to the latest BIOS version, which was version 7E49v1A64, with AGESA PI 1.2.0.3g, at the time of testing. The comparison Intel CPU tests in the graphs below were conducted using an Asus Z790 Dark Hero motherboard for LGA1700 CPUs, and an Asus TUF Z890-Plus WiFi was used to test the LGA1851 chips.

Game benchmarks

I'm not going to beat around the bush here - the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is a fantastic gaming CPU, and its performance is generally on par with that of the 9800X3D. Let's start with Far Cry 6 at 1,920 x 1,080 with High settings, which is a test that responds really well to extra CPU power, particularly extra cache.

As you can see in the graph below, the 9950X3D matches the 9800X3D's average, and its 1fps lower minimum is within the margin of error - both CPUs are clearly winning chips here. Comparatively, the last-gen X3D chips average 192-195fps, while the Core Ultra 7 265K lags a fair way behind at just 173fps.

The difference between CPUs in this game is less pronounced when you increase the settings to Ultra, but the Zen 5 X3D CPUs are still undoubtedly leading the pack. In this case, the 9950X3D was even a little quicker than the 9800X3D, with a fantastic average of 190fps - a result that's still a good 26fps in front of the Core Ultra 7 265K, and 11fps ahead of last-gen X3D CPUs.

Next comes Cyberpunk 2077, which again responds really well to AMD's latest tech. Running the game at 1,920 x 1,080 with the High graphics preset enabled, the 9950X3D averages 230fps, with a minimum of 187fps - a result that's in line with the 9800X3D and Ryzen 7 7800X3D, and also a fair bit ahead of the last-gen 7950X3D. It's also well ahead of the Core Ultra 7 265K, which averages just 207fps with a minimum of 146fps.

The 9950X3D still holds up well when you move more of the burden from the CPU to the GPU, and run the game with the Ultra ray tracing preset and DLSS on the Quality setting. The 9950X3D can't quite catch the eight-core pure X3D chips in this test, but its average is only 3fps behind the 9800X3D, and it's again well ahead of the Core Ultra 7 265K. Again, there's a noticeable difference between the performance of the 9950X3D and its predecessor, the 7950X3D, at these settings, particularly when it comes to the minimum.

There's one of our game tests where Intel's latest chips have the upper hand, however, and that's the Total War: Warhammer III Battle benchmark. In this test, the 9950X3D came second to the Core Ultra 7 265K, but only by 4fps, and it matched the 9800X3D in this test too.

Interestingly, however, this game's Mirrors of Madness benchmark, which sees loads of characters being flung around the scene in whirlwinds, prefers the X3D chips. The 9950X3D puts in a strong showing here, with an average of 129fps, although its minimum of 84fps lags behind the results from the 9800X3D and Core Ultra 7 265K. Again, though, it's quicker than the last-gen X3D CPUs.

Finally, our F1 24 benchmark isn't massively impacted by CPU performance, but the 9950X3D is nevertheless the leader of the pack here, with a class-leading average of 159fps and a minimum of 134fps, putting it ahead of the 9800X3D. The latter result is a good 9fps ahead of the last-gen 7950X3D, and while the differences here aren't huge, the 9950X3D is clearly a strong gaming CPU.

Application benchmarks

Of course, you don't buy a 16-core CPU just for gaming, and the main benefit of the 9950X3D over the 9800X3D is that it can also churn through heavily multi-threaded workloads like a knife through butter. This is ably demonstrated by its Cinebench R23 multi-core result of 42,056, which is a massive 6,342 points ahead of the 7950X3D, and also well ahead of the result from the 24-core Core i9 14900K. Unsurprisingly, it's also enormously quicker than the 23,265 from the eight-core 9800X3D.

You see a similar lead in the latest Cinebench R24 multi-core benchmark too, with the 9950X3D again leading the charge with a superb score of 2,359, compared to 2,110 for the Core i9 14900K, 2,039 for the 7950X3D, and just 1,361 for the eight-core 9800X3D. It's quite possible that the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K could present a challenge in this test, given the strong performance of the 20-core Core Ultra 7 265K compared to the last-gen Core i7 14700K in this test, but it wouldn't be able to compete with the 9950X3D's gaming performance.

It's not just multi-threaded application performance where the 9950X3D excels, though. Thanks to its Zen 5 architecture and 5.7GHz peak clock speed boost, it's also a dab hand at single-threaded work. Again, it's ahead of every other CPU in the PCGamesN lab in the Cinebench R23 single-core test, with its 2,276 result even beating the clocked-up Core i9 14900K.

Likewise, the 9950X3D is also (just) ahead of the Core Ultra 7 265K in the latest Cinebench R24 single-core benchmark, with its extra clock speed helping it get to a score of 137, compared to just 132 on the 9800X3D.

Power draw

With its 16 cores, high clock speed, and TDP of 170W, I wasn't expecting the 9950X3D to rule the power draw charts, but it actually holds up really well in terms of efficiency. With all its 16 cores maxed out running Cinebench, our system drew 333W from the main with the 9950X3D installed, and while that's substantially more than the 9800X3D, or indeed the highly efficient Core Ultra 7 265K, it's still a good 100W less than our Core i9 14900K test rig. That's a good result when you consider the huge multi-threaded performance on offer.

Meanwhile, in our Cyberpunk 2077 gaming test, our system drew 496W from the mains with the 9950X3D installed. Again, that's a comparatively high result - the 9800X3D is much more efficient here for the same basic performance. However, it's still below 500W in a system with an RTX 4080, and it's a good 61W lower than the power draw with the 14900K.

Temperature

Surprisingly, the 9950X3D doesn't generate too much heat when it's running at peak load. The cool-running Intel Core Ultra 7 265K rules the waves here, but the 9950X3D was also easily tamed by our 240mm Corsair AIO liquid cooler. When running Cinebench, the peak temperature of 80°C is well below the scorching temperature of the 14th-gen Raptor Lake chips with the same cooler, and it's also a good 4°C cooler than its predecessor, the 7950X3D.

In games, you're looking at a peak temperature of 72°C, which is again cooler than the 7950X3D and Intel 14th-gen chips, but also 10°C warmer than the Core Ultra 7 265K, and 5°C warmer than the 9800X3D. You'll need a decent CPU cooler to keep the 9950X3D in check, but a 240mm AIO cooler will do the job fine.

Price

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D price is $699.99 at MSRP, and it usually goes for around $670 on Amazon. The price is the only sticking point about this CPU, as there's no getting around the fact that it's extremely expensive. As such, you need to weigh up whether you really need its unique combination of 3D V-cache games and 16 strong Zen 5 cores for multi-threaded work. You can save a lot of money by just buying the Ryzen 7 9800X3D instead, and it will still be plenty fast enough for most people's needs, while largely matching the 9950X3D's gaming pace.

Meanwhile, if multi-threading is your top priority, and you're not that bothered about games, Intel's cheaper Core Ultra chips deliver loads of multi-threading power, while not drawing as much power or generating as much heat.

Alternatives

Intel Core Ultra 7 265K

While we were less than enamored by this Intel Arrow Lake chip when we first reviewed it, our recent Core Ultra 7 265K retest showed that this CPU is no longer a terrible option. No, it's not as fast as AMD's chips in most game benchmarks, but it's no longer lagging enormously behind in games. Also, if your main priority is multi-threaded work, the 265K handles it really well for a surprisingly cheap price, while also running cool and not eating your PSU for breakfast.

Read our full Intel Core Ultra 7 265K review.

AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

If gaming is your top priority, then you can get the same basic gaming performance as the 9950X3D from the 9800X3D for much less money. Plus, while it's nowhere near as fast as the 9950X3D in multi-threaded work, you'll only benefit from this extra speed if you regularly use your PC for heavily multi-threaded workloads, such as 3D rendering and video encoding. If you mainly want a gaming chip, the 9800X3D is much cheaper and basically offers the same performance.

Read our full AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D review.

Verdict

It might have a stratospheric price tag, but AMD knows it can charge $699 if it can genuinely offer you the best CPU on the market, and the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is definitely that chip. Offering the best of both worlds, the 9950X3D is the CPU that can turn its hand to anything. Its gaming performance is right up there with the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, and it makes a complete mockery of Intel's Arrow Lake chips when it comes to games.

Meanwhile, its application performance leads the charts, with its 16 Zen 5 cores making mincemeat of heavily multi-threaded workloads, and its high clock speed giving it a leg up in single-threaded work. It doesn't even run ridiculously hot, considering how much power is on tap, and its power draw is considerably lower than that of Intel's top-end Raptor Lake CPUs from the last generation.

This CPU isn't for everyone - if you only want to play games, you'll get practically no benefit from the extra eight cores, and I advise you to buy the 9800X3D instead. You can also get decent multi-threaded performance from Intel's latest CPUs, as well as AMD's standard Ryzen 9 9950X without 3D V-cache, if you're not bothered about games. If you really want a CPU that can do it all, though, the best option is now undoubtedly the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, and it's a deserved winner of our Excellence award.

That brings me to the end of my 9950X3D review, but if you're thinking of upgrading to this CPU, make sure you read our full guide to buying the best gaming motherboard, so you can give it a good home.