Specs, our gaming estimate and the graphics cards it pairs well with.
The Core i5-6600 is a E-tier gaming processor: #153 of 239 in our list, with 4 cores and 4 threads up to 3.9 GHz. At 1080p it can feed a card like the Arc A580 without a CPU bottleneck above 10%, and at 1440p an Arc B570.
Updated October 3, 2026
Gaming index (Ryzen 7 9800X3D = 100) against the processors closest to it.
The Core i5-6600 scores 23 on our gaming index, where the Ryzen 7 9800X3D is 100. That puts it #153 of 239 processors we track, in E tier. It is slow by current standards, and recent games will often run well below what the graphics card can do.
It has 4 cores and 4 threads, boosting to 3.9 GHz. With 4 cores, the newest games will stutter or limit your frame rate, because they are built for six or more.
The Core i5-6600 uses the LGA1151 socket, so it fits motherboards with that socket. The fastest chips we track on the same socket are Core i9-9900K and Core i7-9700K, which would be a drop-in upgrade without changing the motherboard.
It is rated at 65 W. That is easy to cool; a decent tower cooler is enough, and the box cooler works on some models.
At 1080p, where the processor matters most, the Core i5-6600 can feed a card up to the Arc A580 before it starts to hold the card back by more than 10 percent. At 1440p the limit moves to the Arc B570. At 4K, where the card does most of the work, it can keep up with the GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop. The full list of graphics cards for the Core i5-6600 has the options for each resolution.
The Core i5-6600 is old or low power. Expect new games to run poorly, and look at an upgrade before you buy a new graphics card.
Graphics card performance index it keeps up with at each resolution.
The Core i5-6600 is a E-tier gaming processor: #153 of 239 in our list, with 4 cores and 4 threads up to 3.9 GHz. At 1080p it can feed a card like the Arc A580 without a CPU bottleneck above 10%, and at 1440p an Arc B570.
At 1080p it can feed a card like the Arc A580 without a CPU bottleneck above 10%. At 1440p, a card like the Arc B570 is a reasonable ceiling.