Ryzen 5 5600 vs Ryzen 9 3900X

Gaming speed, cores and clocks

The Ryzen 5 5600 and the Ryzen 9 3900X are within a few percent of each other for gaming. In a game, you will not see the difference.

The Ryzen 5 5600 has 6 cores and 12 threads, and the Ryzen 9 3900X has 12 cores and 24 threads. The extra cores of the Ryzen 9 3900X help with video editing, streaming while you play and heavy multitasking more than with the game itself. Boost clocks are 4.4 GHz and 4.6 GHz.

Platform, power and price

Both chips use the AM4 socket, so they fit the same motherboards. You can swap one for the other without changing the board.

Rated power is 65 W for the first and 105 W for the second. That difference changes the cooler you need, and it shows up in heat and noise.

At launch the Ryzen 5 5600 cost $199 and the Ryzen 9 3900X $499, which gives 28.1 and 11.2 points of gaming performance per $100. Today's prices will differ.

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

At 1080p the Ryzen 5 5600 can feed a card up to the Radeon RX 7900 GRE before it holds the card back by more than 10 percent. The Ryzen 9 3900X reaches the Radeon RX 7900 GRE. Both chips are in the same range for graphics card pairing.

Choose the Ryzen 5 5600 if you want the faster gaming chip. Choose the Ryzen 9 3900X if you would rather spend the difference on a graphics card, which does more for frame rates in most games.