Key information
Amazon previously reduced the price of the Intel Core Ultra 5 250K Plus by 34%, lowering it to an all-time low of $145, though Tom's Hardware reports that the promotional discount has since sold out and Newegg currently lists the processor at $210.
The Arrow Lake Refresh processor features 18 cores split across six Lion Cove performance cores and 12 Skymont efficiency cores, lacking Hyper-Threading while reaching a 5.3 GHz boost clock. As an unlocked K-series component with a 125W PL1 and 250W PL2 power rating, it accommodates overclocking and includes native improvements like a 900 MHz die-to-die frequency bump.
Tom's Hardware notes that the component excels in productivity benchmarks, delivering multithreaded performance 33% above AMD's Ryzen 7 9700X and 80% ahead of the Ryzen 5 9600X. In single-threaded evaluations, the processor outperformed all tested AMD competitors including the Ryzen 9 9950X, while gaming performance averaged close to the Core i5-14600K.
Originally debuting at $200 before its recommended retail price shifted to $220, the CPU was introduced alongside the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus as an Arrow Lake revision. Despite the initial Amazon discount expiring, the chip remains recognized among premier gaming and budget processing hardware options.
