Best CPUs for streaming 2026

While streaming, the CPU does two jobs at once: runs the game and encodes video in OBS. You need fast cores for the game and spare cores for encoding.

#	CPU	Type	Task score	cores/threads	Score
1	Ryzen 9 9950X	Desktop	100.0	16 / 32	100.00
2	Ryzen 9 9950X3D	Desktop	100.0	16 / 32	100.00
3	Core Ultra 9 285K	Desktop	90.8	24 / 24	90.61
4	Ryzen 9 7950X	Desktop	89.5	16 / 32	89.63
5	Ryzen 9 7950X3D	Desktop	87.7	16 / 32	87.61
6	Core i9-14900K	Desktop	83.8	24 / 32	82.96
7	Ryzen 9 9900X	Desktop	82.6	12 / 24	80.49
8	Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme X2E-96-100	Laptop	82.3	18 / 18	80.33
9	Core i9-13900K	Desktop	80.5	24 / 32	79.58
10	Core Ultra 7 265K	Desktop	80.4	20 / 20	79.26
11	Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme X2E-94-100	Laptop	78.8	18 / 18	77.13
12	Snapdragon X2 Elite X2E-90-100	Laptop	74.8	18 / 18	71.79
13	Core Ultra 9 285HX	Laptop	74.5	24 / 24	72.57
14	Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus	Laptop	74.5	24 / 24	72.57
15	Ryzen 9 7900X	Desktop	74.2	12 / 24	72.58
16	Core i7-14700K	Desktop	73.9	20 / 28	72.52
17	Ryzen 9 9955HX	Laptop	73.4	16 / 32	70.65
18	Ryzen 9 9955HX3D	Laptop	73.4	16 / 32	70.65
19	Ryzen AI Max+ 395	Laptop	72.8	16 / 32	70.63
20	Apple M5 Max 18-core	Laptop	71.1	18 / 18	66.96
21	Apple M5 Pro 18-core	Laptop	71.1	18 / 18	66.96
22	Core Ultra 9 275HX	Laptop	70.3	24 / 24	68.09
23	Snapdragon X2 Elite X2E-88-100	Laptop	70.3	18 / 18	67.49
24	Core i9-13980HX	Laptop	69.8	24 / 32	67.93
25	Core i9-14900HX	Laptop	66.3	24 / 32	63.51

Compare the top two: Ryzen 9 9950X vs Ryzen 9 9950X3D →

How we rank

Formula: 60% multi-core, 40% single-core. If you encode on the graphics card (NVENC, AMF), the CPU load is much lower.

The score is our own estimate from the specs (cores, threads, clocks, architecture generation), not a benchmark run. 100 = the fastest CPU in our database.