Ryzen 5 3500 vs Core i5-11400H

Gaming speed, cores and clocks

The Ryzen 5 3500 and the Core i5-11400H are within a few percent of each other for gaming. In a game, you will not see the difference.

The Ryzen 5 3500 has 6 cores and 6 threads, and the Core i5-11400H has 6 cores and 12 threads. Core counts are the same, so cache size and clock speed decide the difference. Boost clocks are 4.1 GHz and 4.5 GHz.

Platform, power and price

The Ryzen 5 3500 uses the AM4 socket and the Core i5-11400H uses BGA, so they need different motherboards, and often different memory. When you compare prices, count the board as well as the chip.

Rated power is 65 W for the first and 45 W for the second. That is close enough that cooling needs will be similar.

We do not have launch prices for both chips, so we cannot compare value.

Which graphics cards each one can feed, and which to buy

At 1080p the Ryzen 5 3500 can feed a card up to the GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 16GB before it holds the card back by more than 10 percent. The Core i5-11400H reaches the GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 16GB. Both chips are in the same range for graphics card pairing.

Choose the Ryzen 5 3500 if you want the faster gaming chip and the same or more cores. Choose the Core i5-11400H if you would rather spend the difference on a graphics card, which does more for frame rates in most games.