After months of leaks and speculation, AMD finally unveiled the first batch of Ryzen 9000 CPUs for desktops at Computex 2024. The four Zen 5 processors which were launched include the 16-core Ryzen 9 9950X, the 12-core Ryzen 9 9900X, the 8-core Ryzen 7 9700X, and the 6-core Ryzen 5 9600X. According to AMD, the Zen 5 processors bring a 16% IPC improvement on average vs the Ryzen 7000 Zen 4 chips.

Courtesy of this IPC gain and improvements like better branch prediction, AMD claims that not only does the flagship Ryzen 9 9950X beat the 14th-gen Core i9-14900K in multi-core workloads with an up to 56% margin, but the Zen 5 chip also brings a bump of 4-23% in gaming performance. For instance, AMD’s numbers put the Ryzen 9 9950X at a substantial 23% ahead of the Core i9-14900K in Horizon Zero Dawn.

However, even with such a seemingly significant increase in gaming performance, AMD says that the Ryzen 9000 CPUs will not be able to beat the Ryzen 7 7800X3D (Available on Amazon).

Ryzen 9 9950X vs Ryzen 7 7800X3D

Arguably the best gaming CPU on the market by our testing, the Ryzen 7 7800X3D marries phenomenal gaming performance with superb efficiency, resulting in a CPU that not only outruns the competition but does so at a comprehensive efficiency advantage. So, the non-X3D Ryzen 9000 dethroning the Ryzen 7 7800X3D was never going to be easy.

Donny Woligrosky, AMD’s Senior Technical Marketing Manager of Consumer Processors, explained to Tom’s Hardware that, although the Ryzen 9 9950X is the faster gaming chip vs the Core i9-14900K per the company’s testing, it won’t be outrunning the Ryzen 7 7800X3D as “X3D is still the king of the hill, but by a much smaller margin than typically between X3D and non-X3D”. So, the Ryzen 9 9950X should trail the Ryzen 7 7800X3D but the delta between the two chips will be lesser than between the Ryzen 9 7950X and the Ryzen 7 7800X3D.

Fortunately, AMD could launch the Ryzen 9000X3D processors as early as September with an improved 3D V-Cache. According to Donny Woligrosky, Team Red is “super committed” to Zen 5 X3D and the company is “working on reiterating it and not just rehashing” the X3D solution.

Long story short, if all you care about is gaming performance, the Ryzen 7 7800X3D is currently your best bet. If you already own the processor, you’ll have to wait a few months to see what kind of gaming performance the Ryzen 9000X3D and Intel Arrow Lake chips bring to the table.