Intel Core Ultra X9 388H chip crushes AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 470, Core Ultra 9 285H in latest Passmark appearance

The recently revealed Intel Core Ultra X9 388H "Panther Lake" CPU has finally landed on Passmark. The results seem to indicate rather modest performance improvements compared to the outgoing chips, despite Intel's claims of monstrous performance uplifts to the tune of 60% in multithreaded workloads.

Core Ultra X9 388H soundly defeats predecessor despite lower clocks

The Intel Core Ultra X9 388H sports a 16-core setup, consisting of four Cougar Cove high-performance cores, eight Darkmont efficiency cores, and another 4 Darkmont low-power efficiency cores. The Arc B390 iGPU with 12 Xe3 cores handles graphics. As indicated by the Passmark listing, spotted by @x86deadandback on X, the 388H manages to score just under 38,000 points in multithread, and around 4450 points in single-thread.

Compared to the Core Ultra 9 285H, the Panther Lake chip demonstrates a roughly 10% improvement in the multithread department, while the single-thread scores are nearly identical. As of right now, only two samples of the 388H have visited Passmark. Therefore, the score reported will definitely change quite a bit as more and more test results are uploaded. Considering that the 285H has a 300 MHz faster boost clock than the 388H, and also sports a higher P-core ratio, the results certainly seem pretty promising.

Core Ultra X9 388H vs Ryzen AI 9 HX 470: The numbers are promising for Intel

Moreover, fans of Team Red will be quite disappointed to hear that the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 470 managed to score only around 36,500 and 4,200 points in 1T and nT respectively, granting the Panther Lake chip a narrow win. Of course, a benchmark is rarely ever enough to draw conclusions, but it does seem like AMD will have a tough time competing with big blue in 2026.

As pointed out by TechPowerUp, the most exciting aspect of the new Panther Lake chip is likely the Arc B390 iGPU. As leaked benchmarks have revealed, the B390 absolutely demolishes the Radeon 890M, defeating it by almost 100% in real-world gaming tests. For smaller notebooks that cannot accommodate discrete GPUs, as well as mini PCs, the Panther Lake chips sure do appear quite promising.

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