Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus Ends Up 10% Faster In ST & 11% Faster In MT Versus 285K In Latest Leak

Feb 2, 2026 at 08:01am EST
An Intel Core Ultra Plus processor is displayed next to the text '290K' against a blue-green geometric background.

Intel's Core Ultra 9 290K Plus CPU has leaked out once again, and delivers up to a 11% performance boost over the 285K.

Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus Is Up To 11% Faster Than Core Ultra 9 285K In Latest Leak

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus will be the flagship chip within the Core Ultra 200S Plus "Arrow Lake Refresh" family. This chip is expected to retain the same configuration unless the blue team suddenly comes out with a new Arrow Lake-S die, which remains highly unlikely. So we can expect the CPU to offer the same 24 cores, 24 threads, but with higher clock speeds and possibly a higher TDP too.

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The latest tests were carried out on the ASUS ROG STRIX Z890-E Gaming WIFI motherboard with 64 GB of DDR5-6800 memory.

As for the performance, the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K PLUS CPU scored 3535 points in the single-thread test and 25,106 points in the multi-core tests. When compared to the Core Ultra 9 285K, this is a 10% uplift in single-core and 11% improvement in multi-core tasks. This is a nice improvement versus the previous 7% and 9% gains. When compared to AMD's fastest chip, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D, the 290K PLUS offers a 4% improvement in single-core and a 13% improvement in multi-core tasks.

The following is how the performance stacks up:

Geekbench 6 (Higher is Better)
ST
MT
0
5000
10000
15000
20000
25000
30000
0
5000
10000
15000
20000
25000
30000
Core Ultra 9 290K Plus (New)
3535
25106
Core Ultra 9 290K Plus (Old)
3456
24610
Core Ultra 9 285K
3202
22580
Ryzen 9 9950X3D
3397
22156

Now we don't expect the gaming performance of the 290K Plus to be much different than the existing 285K, and AMD's 3D V-Cache chips are going to retain their phenomenal lead.

The lineup looks a lot like a last effort to clear some additional 800-series motherboard inventory before the launch of the next-gen Nova Lake-S platform, which will feature a brand new socket, "LGA 1954". Expect more leaks and details of the lineup in the coming months as we approach the launch.

Intel Core Ultra 200S "Arrow Lake" and Arrow Lake Refresh CPU Specs:

CPUCores/ThreadsBase Clock (P/E Core)Max Boost (P/E Core)Cache (L3 / L2)Memory SupportTDP (PL1 / PL2)Price (SEP)
Core Ultra 9 290K Plus24/24 (8+16)3.7 / 3.2 GHz5.8 / 4.8 GHz36 MB / 40 MBDDR5-7200125W / 250WCancelled
Core Ultra 9 285K24/24 (8+16)3.7 / 3.2 GHz5.7 / 4.6 GHz36 MB / 40 MBDDR5-6400125W / 250W$589 US
Core Ultra 7 270K Plus24/24 (8+16)3.7 / 3.2 GHz5.5 / 4.7 GHz36 MB / 40 MBDDR5-7200125W / 250W$299 US
Core Ultra 7 265K20/20 (8+12)3.9 / 3.3 GHz5.5 / 4.6 GHz30 MB / 36 MBDDR5-6400125W / 250W$394 US
Core Ultra 7 265KF20/20 (8+12)3.9 / 3.3 GHz5.5 / 4.6 GHz30 MB / 36 MBDDR5-6400125W / 250W$379 US
Core Ultra 5 250K Plus18/18 (6+12)4.2 / 3.5 GHz5.3 / 4.7 GHz24 MB / 26 MB ?DDR5-7200125W / 159W$199 US
Core Ultra 5 245K14/14 (6+8)4.2 / 3.6 GHz5.2 / 4.6 GHz24 MB / 26 MBDDR5-6400125W / 159W$309 US
Core Ultra 5 245KF14/14 (6+8)4.2 / 3.6 GHz5.2 / 4.6 GHz24 MB / 26 MBDDR5-6400125W / 159W$294 US

News Source: Benchleaks

About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.

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