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Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake is on the way and set to bring a fierce battle with AMD’s recently unveiled Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 processors towards the end of the year. We’re bringing you everything we know about the upcoming chipset generation from the projected price, specs, potential release window, and more.
Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake release date
There’s been no confirmed Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake release date at the time of writing. However, it’s expected that the company’s newest generation line could launch as early as October according to current online discourse from credible sources. The Intel Investor Meeting Keynote from February this year has stated Q4’22.
According to Videocardz, who reported on an alleged GTM roadmap, Intel is planning on showcasing Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake on September 27 during the annual Intel Innovation event. Should this leak prove true later this month, then we could expect the Core i9-13900K pre-orders on the day, followed by the i7-13700K and i5-13600K pre-orders and release the following month.
A more specific time window could be on the cards, though. It’s been circulated that they could launch the month after the announcement according to the prominent leaker, ECSM_Official. Enthusiastic Citizen, who has also provided extensive performance leaks, claimed a release date of October 20.
Lending credence to this time frame for this release date is the consistent pattern that we’ve seen with the manufacturer’s previous line, Alder Lake. This line was formally unveiled on October 27, 2021 (during last year’s Innovation event), and released in November.
Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake rumored specs
Although little has been officially stated about the specs of the upcoming Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake processors, what information we have to go off of paints a promising picture. Much like Alder Lake before it, the new line of chipsets will be based upon the Intel 7 framework.
All Raptor Lake processors will once again utilize the LGA 1700 socket which debuted last year. We know that Z790 motherboards are in production from the likes of MSI, Asus, Gigabyte, and ASRock. A leak analyzed motherboard technical information, reported by Videocardz, confirms support for the 12th and 13th Gen.
Raptor Lake will consist of processors built with the hybrid architecture, P-cores and E-cores similar to the previous line. The difference here, though, is the new Raptor Cove CPU cores, which will replace Alder Lake’s Golden Cove for better overall performance. E-cores will remain the same, however, unchanged from the existing Gracemont architecture, according to Moore’s Law is Dead.
The top-end of the upcoming generation, likely to be the i9-13900K, is reported to have 24 cores and 32 threads. This is according to information from the aforementioned investor’s meeting. For the rest of the lineup, though, it’s likely to be very similar to last year. This includes support for PCIe 5.0 standards, meaning greater GPU and NVMe SSD performance, too.
Rumors of specific models have been speculated by several outlets, with established hardware leaker, harukaze5719, sharing a full list of Raptor Lake’s release models. True to Intel’s internal information, the flagship model is alleged to feature 24 cores.
| CPU | Cores | Base Frequency | Boost Clock | Cache | TDP | Estimated Price |
| Intel Core i9-13900K | 8P+16E | 3.0 GHz | 5.8 GHz | 68MB | 125W | $600 |
| Intel Core i9-13900KF | 8P+16E | 3.0 GHz | 68MB | 125W | ||
| Intel Core i9-13900F | 8P+16E | 2.0 GHz | 68MB | 65W | ||
| Intel Core i9-13900 | 8P+16E | 2.0 GHz | 68MB | 65W | ||
| Intel Core i7-13700K | 8P+8E | 3.4 GHz | 5.4 GHz | 54MB | 125W | $420 |
| Intel Core i7-13700KF | 8P+8E | 3.4 GHz | 5.4 GHz | 54MB | 125W | |
| Intel Core i7-13700F | 8P+8E | 2.1 GHz | 54MB | 65W | ||
| Intel Core i7-13700 | 8P+8E | 2.1 GHz | 54MB | 65W | ||
| Intel Core i5-13600K | 6P+8E | 3.5 GHz | 5.2 GHz | 44MB | 125W | $300 |
| Intel Core i5-13600 | 6P+8E | 2.7 GHz | 5.2 GHz | 24MB | 65W | |
| Intel Core i5-13500 | 6P+8E | 3.0 GHz | 24MB | 65W | ||
| Intel Core i5-13400 | 6P+4E | 2.5 GHz | 20MB | 65W |
Based on this information, we can essentially view Raptor Lake as a refined and improved version of what’s come before rather than a revolution. The K-models will be released this year, and other iterations will follow into 2023, as is standard.
The focus on the next processor generation appears to be on the clock speeds, as all three of the release day K-series models are capable of exceeding 5 GHz, with the flagship featuring a boost clock closer to 6 GHz. We’ve seen a real push towards single-threaded performance, and clock speeds this high would certainly be beneficial for high-end gaming.
Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake price
Little has circulated around the expected prices for the next generation of Team Blue’s processors, however, the pricing structure is likely to main consistent with past releases. Considering that Alder Lake’s flagship i9-12900K was released at $589, we can estimate that the i9-13900K will come in around the $600 mark.
If the company is wanting to compete with AMD’s Zen 4 architecture, of which the top-end 7950X retails at $699, the asking price is unlikely to be higher. As for the i7-13700K and i5-13600K, the respective MSRP of each is likely to hover around $420 and $300. This is taking into account the 8% price increase that took place between Tiger Lake and Alder Lake.
Will Raptor Lake be as fast as Zen 4?
It’s currently too close to tell if Intel’s upcoming chipset generation will match or surpass what AMD has releasing soon. Judging that the 7600X beats out the i9-12900K, it remains to be seen as to whether the new Raptor Cove cores can push Team Blue over the edge. One thing’s for sure, the battle of PCIe 5.0 speeds will be fiercely fought at the end of the year.
Will Raptor Lake support DDR4 and DDR5 memory?
It has been confirmed that 13th Gen Intel will support both DDR4-3200 and DDR5-5600 as the LGA 1700 chipset is in use. This means existing, and new, motherboards will be able to utilize both generations of memory.
Should I buy a new cooler and PSU for Raptor Lake CPU?
Any existing LGA 1700 compliant air and water coolers should fit onto existing motherboards as the socket type is the same. If the rumored specs are true, then there is no major increase in the TDP requirements either, so your existing PSU and CPU cooler should be fine still.