What jobs we grade
- Gaming. Game performance, where fast cores and large caches count more than many cores.
- Productivity. Sustained multi-core work such as compiling, rendering and encoding.
- Performance per watt. Work done for the power used, for quiet, cool or always-on systems.
TDP is the manufacturer’s rated power figure. Actual consumption varies by model and workload. Processors have their own performance measures, so a processor grade can never be compared with a graphics card grade.
The filters that matter
- Socket. Which motherboards it fits (AM5, AM4, LGA 1851, LGA 1700…). Filter by it first if you keep your motherboard.
- Memory type. DDR4 or DDR5, matching your motherboard.
- Minimum capability for your job.
- Integrated graphics, if you will run without a graphics card.
- Cores and threads, and unlocked for overclocking boards.
Compatibility to check
The socket and memory type above. If you are upgrading, the upgrade planner says whether a faster processor drops in or needs a platform change. If you build new, compare the cost of processor, board and memory together.
What you will see in Explorer
One row per processor with its price, the grade for your job, Value, cores, socket and power. Open Specs for the rest.
Things to check outside The Comparator
- Cooler and case clearance
- Whether your board’s BIOS supports the chip
- Overclocking results. Unlocked means it can be overclocked, not what you will get.
- Heat and noise in your build
For the efficiency question in depth, see the Price2Click guide to energy-efficient CPUs.