Intel is facing stiffer competition than ever before, with new players from AMD and Qualcomm, but they seem to be up for the challenge. At CES 2025 Intel gave more details about the newer gaming-focused chips, the Intel Core Ultra 200H CPU and their most preformative option launching a bit later in Q1 2025, the Intel Core Ultra 200HX.
While Intel’s Lunar Lake brought us thin and light laptops, the new 200H series brings true mobile gaming, all while showing what is possible with a lower power draw. With these new CPU ranges, Intel is delivering new chips that are built to take on the needs of creators and gamers, all while including the new advantages Arrow Lake brings to the table.
Starting with the new Intel Core Ultra 200H Series, Intel has built a mobile CPU that delivers more performance without the sacrifices we often see with efficiently and capabilities. The new 200H Series also sees improvements with AI acceleration, and brings 99 TOPS to be used in a range of AI applications, and graphical enhancements that allow it to deliver mobile gaming without a dGPU like ever before. Even better still, these gains are about more than benchmarks on a chart: they mean real world enhancements that will lead to major improvements for the performance of the games you like most.
On the CPU side of things, Intel Core Ultra 200H brings over the performance of Arrow Lake to laptops in 2025. On the top end, the Intel Core Ultra 9 brings a total of 16 threads (6P cores, 2 LP-E cores, and 16 T cores) all working together to offer an efficient but powerful computing platform running with a max boost clock of 5.4GHz.
This chip also sees the chip offer 77 GPU TOPS to take on AI workflows. What is even more impressive is the full Intel Core Ultra H range offers solid specs, from the Ultra 9 285H down to the Core Ultra 5 225H, giving gamers, content creators and laptop makers, a range of options to jump on, all with performance making them a force to be reckoned with.
But what is potentially most exciting is the Intel ARC GPU side of the Intel Core Ultra 200H platform. While Lunar Lake proved gaming on integrated graphics in a thin and light laptop, Intel Core Ultra 200H steps things up a notch, offering a much more preformative option ready to take on more complex tasks. With up to eight Intel Xe cores featuring Intel Xe Matrix extension (XMX) for AI acceleration, you can manage up to 22% better performance, all while using less energy when comparing last generation H to this generation.
While that may not sound like much, as Intel demonstrated at CES, for games that support it, you can get over 60FPS in games like F1 24, all while using less than half the power of last generations comparable chip. The list of Intel Xe optimized games is still not as extensive when compared to DLSS, but as we saw when we looked at the Intel ARC B580, the list is growing, and the performance is catching up fast. With Intel investing in Intel ARC, these performance gains and driver improvements trickle down to all their devices, making the performance better for everyone.
“The H series, people call them thin and powerful, they’re 28 to 45 watts. They have integrated graphics,” explained interim Client Computing Group GM, Jim Johnson. “So for many segments or even creators, that may be perfect. But we allow, or you, can also plug in a discrete graphics card. But if you want the highest performance, highest and newest discrete GPU with the latest I/O, with desktop type I/O, that’s HX. And that can go up to 55 watts, 65 watts. I’ve seen 120 watt systems. So it’s just a different user of that system than the ones I call thin and powerful.”
Intel Lunar Lake already felt like a major leap for X86 on mobile, and with Qualcomm still lagging behind on the Windows side of things in gaming and content creation, as Intel improves on the graphics, overall performance, and power draw, the ability to have a laptop that can power through video editing, gaming and anything else you can throw at it, all while delivering an all day battery life, without compromising I/O is just amazing to see.
For the gamers and the content creators that want the most from their mobile gaming, Intel also brings the new Intel Core Ultra 200 HX CPU to the table starting later Q1 2025. This is touted as the first mobile enthusiast AI PC with a built-in NPU delivering 13 TOPS, all while being tailor-made to be paired with a discrete GPU, offering massive potential for anyone wanting the most from their new laptop.
While we have a bit of time before the new Intel Core Ultra 200HX based laptops hit the market, they are already looking like monsters when it comes to gaming and performance. In the tests they showcased with Cinebench R24, the HX based laptop was scoring on average around double what the AMD or older laptops managed.
While benchmarking only tells part of the story, it provides a glimpse of how a laptop with the new HX processor compares to the competition. This chip is designed for the latest workflows and built to compete with the best options on the market.
When paired with a GPU capable of delivering top-tier performance, it eliminates bottlenecks, ensuring incredible results while maintaining efficiency and performance—without the usual compromises seen in this range. The HX series also supports up to 48 total PCIe lanes, including PCIe 4.0 and 5.0, allowing laptop manufacturers to deliver the best storage, I/O, and GPUs available on a laptop.
It is also worth noting that while the HX series does bring ARC graphics to the SoC, it is only four cores, compared to the eight we see on the Core Ultra H range, meaning this is a CPU made to be paired with a GPU to deliver the best possible system you can get this generation. In a move that also is aimed directly at the enthusiast market, some select SKU’s in the Core Ultra 200HX range will even allow overclocking out of the box, meaning you can push the potential of your laptop even further than the box may suggest.
It may not be for everyone, but the potential for people to squeeze every last drop of performance out of their laptop, without compromising on other aspects is amazing to see, and something I wish was more common for gaming and content creator machines like this.
Intel seems eager to give options for the people that want performance out of their mobile gaming and creator laptops. Jim Johnson put it very clearly in an answer to PC Gamer during a round table discussion: “If you want desktop-type I/O and unconstrained performance in a mobile system, the H series is in that 28-45-watt sweet spot. The HX series lets performance go as high as they want, and we’ve also packed in all the I/O so when you put in the new big discrete graphics card, you can really let it run.”
There are a lot of questions we at CGMagazine have about the new Intel Core Ultra 200H and 200HX processors, including what the laptops will be like and what the real world gaming and content creation potential will be, but one thing is for sure, we are excited. This looks to be one of the most enthusiast-focused mobile launches from Intel in a long while.
The chipmaker giant is finally pushing the envelope on what is possible on X86 in a laptop, making things more exciting than ever. More competition is a good thing, and what we saw at CES 2025 is anything to go on, Intel is finally off the bench and ready to fight fire with fire to win back the hearts and minds of gamers, content creators, and anyone who demands the most from their mobile computer.