AMD says Ryzen 9000X CPUs won’t beat 7000X3D in gaming

3D, that's the magic acronym.

An AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D held over green grass
Image: Club386

AMD promises Ryzen 9000X processors will push performance to new heights, relative to their predecessors. However, these chips lack 3D V-Cache, meaning it would take significant uplifts to usurp 7000X3D CPUs in gaming. Asking Team Red about this, it’s clear that its older stock will rule the roost a while longer.

When it comes to the best CPU for gaming, there’s none better option than Ryzen 7 7800X3D right now. Its 96MB of L3 cache goes a long way to boosting its performance in games. In fact, the chip trades blows with flagships including Core i9 14900K and is much more efficient. Shiny as the new AMD Ryzen 9000X series appears, it might be worth hanging on to your existing X3D processor.

Senior Technical Marketing Manager of Consumer Processors, Donny Woligroski, shared AMD’s perspective on 9000X vs 7000X3D. Speaking with Tom’s Hardware, Woligroski says, “X3D is still the king of the hill, but by a much smaller margin than typically between X3D and non-X3D.” He explains further, “a 7800X3D would, yes, be faster than 9700X, but maybe not by as much as you would expect.”

In its Ryzen 9000X series Computex reveal, AMD didn’t provide comparative benchmarks to 7000X3D processors. Instead, Team Red proudly touted an average 11% advantage for Ryzen 9 9950X over Core i9 14900K. As such, it’s difficult to extrapolate what margins we should expect between the two. Given the CPUs arrive in July 2024, we thankfully won’t have to wait long to find out.

For those that can exercise a little more patience, we exclusively revealed that 9000X3D CPUs should arrive relatively soon after. Good things come to those who wait, and this eventual X3D face-off should prove a more compelling comparison.

For more processor news, check out our Ryzen AI 300 series explainer for a guide to AMD’s new laptop chips.