Ryzen's X3D chips appear to be outselling all of its other chips, and Intel's latest aren't even coming close, if sales figures shared by a German retailer are accurate.
As reported by Videocardz, the new Ryzen 7 9800X3D is reportedly selling quite well. German retailer Mindfactory reports its sales figures alongside all listings of CPUs, which means you can see how many have been previously sold while you check out each CPU.
The Ryzen 7 7800X3D, the previous best CPU for gaming, and the chip that drives my own rig, for example, shows as having sold 78,470 units to date on its listing. This is expected from such a well-regarded chip but the most interesting sales figures are in the recent competing Ryzen chips.
The Ryzen 7 9800X3D, which is currently the best CPU for gaming has racked up 9,160 sales in just over a month, whereas the Ryzen 5 9600X, Ryzen 9 9900X, and Ryzen 9 9950X, all of which launched in August, are below 1,000 sales each. The Ryzen 5 7600X3D, which also launched in August has 8,570 sales. The 7600X3D infamously had a bit of a staggered launch, due to originally only being available at a single seller in the US.
We thought all three of the named non-3D chips were pretty solid in our testing, and the Ryzen 9 9950X is our choice for best high-end CPU but it's just not great value for money at around $700, which could account for those lacklustre sales. This follows on from a report in August, claiming the 9600X and 9700X weren't selling very well.
Of course, it's important to note that these are just the sales figures from a single retailer in a single country and that there's a little bit of wiggle room with those figures due to changing sales and multiple listings of some chips. They don't necessarily indicate broader sales figures but can give a rough idea of how the chips are seen in the market.
It's important to note that the non-X3D chips launched in the same month and mostly give marginal returns for the extra cost investment. They are therefore a bit more of an enthusiast pick, or good for someone looking to game and heavily edit videos from the same rig.
However, these sales could also be a testament to AMD's cache chiplet technology. X3D processors get better gaming performance due to the 3D V-Cache tech. If you are a dedicated gamer who wants the highest frame rate per dollar, it's likely that an X3D chip is on your radar. It was on mine before I upgraded just a few months ago and my performance has been outstanding for the price.
On the flip side of this, Intel's sales figures indicate they aren't all that popular, especially with the latest wave of chips not performing great. All listings of the Intel Core Ultra 5 245K, which launched in October, have sold less than 100 units, which is a similar figure for the Core Ultra 9 285. Mindfactory's best-selling Arrow Lake chip is the Core Ultra 7 265K but that's just managed just over 200 sales across all listings.
Not that it's been much better for Intel's last-gen processors, as the Core i9 14900K has sold a mere 2,950 units. Ouch.
Best CPU for gaming: Top chips from Intel and AMD.
Best gaming motherboard: The right boards.
Best graphics card: Your perfect pixel-pusher awaits.
Best SSD for gaming: Get into the game first.
