Intel CPU Naming Explained!

 You might have confused with many random numbers and letters on Intel CPU’s😵. I’m talking about i9-10900KF, i5-8250U or i7-8300HQ etc. What does these even mean?😕 As it turns out, these have some specific meaning and are not some random stuffs Intel throws at buyers to confuse them. Although it sounds a bit complicated, once you understood the basics, it’s pretty simple. So I’m going to give you the explanation about these mysterious numbers in this post😎.

Starting with basics, Intel have a line-up of core series processors other than their Pentium and Xeon series. Namely Core i3, i5, i7 and i9. These are brand modifiers which distinguish one from another in the core series CPU’s. You can understand what does rest of the numbers mean from this illustration👇

🔶Gen indicator specifies about the CPU generation. We are currently at 10^th gen for both desktop and notebook processors.

🔶SKU or stock keeping unit is for uniquely identifying an exact CPU model. Usually a higher number generally indicates more features and capabilities.

🔶Product line suffix indicates some cool features of the CPU. Here are some common letters and its meaning along with an example.

🔹Desktop CPU’s:

K=multiplier is unlocked, can be overclocked (i9-10900K).

KF=overclockable, no iGPU (i5-10600KF).

KS=overclockable, special edition (i9-9900KS).

X=high-end with more cores and threads (i9-10900X).

XE=extreme edition (i9-9980XE)

E=support for ECC memory (i3-7101E)
🔹Mobile CPU’s:

H=high performance iGPU

HQ=high performance iGPU with 4 (quad) CPU cores.

HK=overclockable with high performance iGPU

G=with discrete Radeon Vega M GPU

U=ultra-low power (i5-4200U)

Y=extremely low power (i7-7Y75)

With that being said, let’s try to decrypt some processors from the blue team😅.

⭕i5-8250U=it’s from core i5 series, it’s an 8^th gen processor and it’s a mobile chip since there is ‘U’.

 ⭕i7-10700KF=it’s from core i7 series, it’s the new 10^th gen CPU, its unlocked hence overclockable (K) and it does not have an iGPU.

And that’s how you do it!😎 Hope this post helped you to understand the naming method behind Intel CPU’s. Have a wonderful day!🤩