Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus Leak Points to Arrow Lake Desktop Refresh

A new Geekbench database entry has revealed the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus, offering the clearest early look yet at Intel’s upcoming Arrow Lake desktop refresh.

Intel has already confirmed that an Arrow Lake Refresh is planned, but the company has not officially announced model names, specifications, or a launch window.

Geekbench listing reveals a 10% increase in performance

As Guru 3D writes, a leaked Geekbench entry pairs the Core Ultra 9 290K Plus with an ASUS ROG Strix Z890-E Gaming Wi-Fi motherboard and 64 GB of DDR5-6800 memory, suggesting testing on a near-final enthusiast platform.

The results were also compared directly against the current Core Ultra 9 285K, highlighting noticeable uplifts across both single- and multi-threaded workloads.

Based on these figures, the 290K Plus delivers roughly a 10% gain in single-threaded performance and about an 11% uplift in multi-threaded workloads.

Same core layout, higher clocks expected

Leaks suggest the Core Ultra 9 290K Plus keeps the same 24-core configuration as the 285K, split into 8 performance cores and 16 efficiency cores. Power limits are also expected to remain unchanged, with a 125 W PL1 and 250 W PL2.

The performance bump likely comes from higher clocks rather than architectural changes. Rumors point to efficiency cores boosting up to 4.8 GHz, around 200 MHz higher than before, while performance cores may gain roughly 100 MHz on turbo and thermal velocity boost limits.

The Geekbench run itself shows the CPU reaching around 5.7 GHz boost clocks during testing.

The Arrow Lake Refresh is expected to stay on the LGA 1851 socket, keeping compatibility with existing Z890 motherboards. This could allow current Z890 users to upgrade their CPU without replacing the entire platform.

That said, motherboard vendors will likely need to roll out timely BIOS updates to ensure full support for the new chips.

As always, a single Geekbench result serves only as an early signal. Factors such as BIOS maturity, memory tuning, and operating system configuration can significantly affect benchmark outcomes.

Final judgments will depend on independent reviews that examine gaming performance, creator workloads, sustained clocks, thermals, and power efficiency once Arrow Lake Refresh CPUs officially launch.

At the same time, Intel may restrict Arc iGPU branding based on memory configuration, limiting how some systems are marketed. Intel has also unveiled its Xeon 600 CPUs, offering up to 86 cores for high-end workstation users, signaling tighter product segmentation across its lineup.