Apple should be worried - Intel Panther Lake Benchmarked

It's no secret that for years, Intel, once the king of CPUs, has kind of been struggling to compete with the likes of AMD, Apple, hell, even Qualcomm. But finally, here in the top secret back rooms of CES 2026, we're getting our first look at the most exciting thing to come from Intel in literally years. Code named Panther Lake. This new lineup of mobile chips featuring Intel's brand new 18A process node are promising up to 50% more multi-threaded performance, 10% more singlethreaded performance, all at the same power as last gen, and a monumental 50% increase in GPU performance. Supposedly enough that this tiny chip's integrated graphics can on average best that of a dedicated Nvidia RTX 4050 mobile GPU by around 10%. So, let's check it out. Oh this is the wrong room. And unlike most trade show announcements, which are more paper than I guess you would say sand, Intel was confident enough to give us unrestricted access to the flagship chip, the Core Ultra X9 388H with its 16 CPU cores and 12 XC3 graphics cores and told us run any game you want at any settings to show you how it actually performs. Unfortunately, we didn't have infinite time with the test laptop. So, I'm back at the hotel to look at the results. Starting with everybody's favorite, Counter Strike 2. At 1080p in the low preset with the most basic anti-aliasing on and fidelity FX upscaling turned off, I was seeing an average of 250 FPS across multiple runs with a 1% low of 145. And when turned up to the high preset, an average of around 130 FPS with 1% lows closer to 80. Now, unfortunately, I didn't have an AMD or Lunar Lake laptop around to compare to, at least one running Windows. But with the numbers I found online for AMD's HX 370 showing around 145 FPS on low with upscaling turned on, well, it seems like Intel is absolutely crushing on the graphics side. and my numbers were within 1 FPS of what Intel was claiming on the graphs that they showed, which is a really good sign. In Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p native in the high preset, I saw an average of 57 FPS. Given that's around what I could find online for AMD's HX 370 chip at 1080p medium, even with the small bump that the newer AMD chips are going to get for clock speed, I think it's safe to say that Intel is going to be in the lead here, too. In Doom: The Dark Ages and Forza Horizon 5, both at 1080p high as well, we saw average frame rates of 29 and 102 FPS, respectively. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find any comparables for Doom, but I did find AMD for the numbers around 77 FPS. Again, a really good sign for Intel's new Panther Lake lineup. But I need to get some devices in the studio first before we can really say for sure. But regardless, it's looking very impressive. Not unlike how impressed I was when I first tried today's sponsor, Comply. If you rock AirPods Pro like me, Complyy's memory foam ear tips are a massive upgrade over the ones that come with the headphones. The Comply foam tips take it to the next level with noticeably better noise isolation, a more secure in-ear fit, and they're way more comfortable for long listening sessions. Comply makes ear tips compatible with almost every pair of earbuds on the market, including the previous AirPods Pro. So, if you kept your Pro Twos for the better sound, but you feel like you're missing out on the improved ANC, the True Grip and True Grip Max can solve that for you. So, what are you waiting for? Why not upgrade your earbud experience without breaking the bank at comply.com or at the link down in the description? >> You have 20 seconds to comply. >> I think you'd better do what he says, Mr. Kenny. Back on the Intel front, it was also great to see that throughout our testing, the Lenovo Idea Pad Pro 5 they gave us to use stayed at like perfectly reasonable noise levels and didn't get uncomfortably hot to the touch either, further adding to Intel's claims of improved power efficiency. But how did Intel actually accomplish this? They're using a similar core configuration as their previous generation Lunar Lake platform with three discrete core types. We've got performance cores, efficiency cores, and low power efficiency cores in various quantities depending on the chip. And while the Core Ultra 388H that we played with today does have a more performanceoriented core configuration than the chip it's replacing, we should also be seeing a ton of gains from Intel's new 18A process, the most advanced node they've ever brought into mass production. The tech behind it is easily enough for its own video. But in short, there's two new key technologies. First, ribbon fat transistors. They're what's known as gate all-around transistors, and they're very similar in style to what's being used by TSMC and Samsung already. Finally, Intel is catching up here and they afford Intel lower operating voltages, more efficient switching of the transistors, and tighter power control with power being a common trend here since the other core technology called power via allows Intel to power the transistors inside the CPU on the opposite side of the wafer from where the data connections are made. This results in shorter power paths inside of the CPU, which reduces the loss incurred to resistance and allows them to increase the density of their cells. You put that together and you get a big chunk of the power efficiency improvements on Panther Lake. You get better frequency scaling and ultimately better performance. Hopefully on their lowest end six core chips all the way up to the 16 core monster that we got to play with today. But that's just the CPU. On the GPU side, while Intel is manufacturing the lower-end four core GPU tiles in-house on their Intel 3 process node, the 12 core GPU tile that we got to play with today is manufactured by TSMC with their N3E process with most of the performance improvements we saw today coming from optimizations to the hardware design of the GPU and less from a new process node with four extra XE graphics cores on the top- end chip, more L2 cache, wider pipelines, higher thread analyst, per core and enhanced ray tracing hardware all working together to provide the performance we saw today. As for productivity and CPU benchmarks, while we were allowed to run them, I'm not allowed to tell you about them until the official review embargo on January 26. and get subscribed because with how these gaming results look already, I'll definitely be reviewing one of these laptops like the ZenBook Duo from Asus with dual 144 hertz OLED panels. Or maybe the bigger brother, the Zephorus Duel, also with dual OLED panels, but this one comes with up to a 5090. And I guess if you want a keyboard, but but like let's be real, the keyboard goes down here. And on the MSI side, we've got the Stealth 16 AI, also panther-l like, also with up to a 5090 and also good looking. Or on the more normal side of the spectrum, the Expert Book Ultra, which also has a crazy screen, a tandem OLED that hits 1,400 nits peak brightness, full graphics [music] in this. It's also cool to see the non-laptop configurations where Panther Lake is already popping up. Super Micro had this cute little mini PC on display. Look at how small the little heat sink is. Or the new Nucks Asus was showing off. They're a bit more businessoriented, but once these chips start to trickle down into mini PCs like from Minis Forum or Beink, I can't wait. So, let me know down in the comments which Panther Lake devices you're most excited about. And while you're down there, hit that subscribe button, like the video, and consider checking out my Patreon where you can watch these videos adree for just a couple bucks a month. Goodbye.

Upgrade your ear buds with Comply foam ear tips at https://jakkuh.com/comply Support me on Patreon! https://jakkuh.com/patreon At CES 2026, Intel is officially showing off their brand new Panther Lake mobile processors, and they’re so confident about the performance, they gave us unattended access to benchmark any games we wanted, at any settings. Today we finally get to show you the results. Subscribe to a wild Andy and Alex from the background of this video: @zip_tie_tech ► Products Featured in this Video! ◄ Buy an Intel laptop: https://jakkuh.com/k1HCA Buy a USB-C Charger: https://jakkuh.com/8S2Yu Buy a MacBook Pro: https://jakkuh.com/2FjTr Buy a Lego Porsche: https://jakkuh.com/iSri8 ► Laptops Featured in this Video! ◄ ASUS ExpertBook Ultra: https://jakkuh.com/qc6pn ASUS Zephyrus Duo: https://jakkuh.com/4DOCy ASUS Zenbook Duo: https://jakkuh.com/eag5F MSI Stealth: https://jakkuh.com/G7xCC Purchases made through some store links may provide some compensation to the creator. ► GET EXCLUSIVE CONTENT ON MY PATREON: https://jakkuh.com/patreon ► COMPANIES THAT SUPPORT US: https://jakkuh.com/partners ► MY GAMING PC: https://jakkuh.com/gaming-setup ► MY HOMELAB GEAR: https://jakkuh.com/homelab ► MY CAMERA GEAR: https://jakkuh.com/camera-setup My Socials: - Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jakkuh_t - Twitter/X: https://x.com/jakkuh_t Music provided by https://epidemicsound.com