The Intel Core Ultra 7 270K Plus can now be yours for $255 from Amazon US, giving you 15% off the CPU’s launch price. That gets you a whopping amount of multi-core performance for the money, not forgetting the chip’s solid gaming performance too.
Intel Core Ultra 7 270K Plus
“Offering a massive amount of multi-core value and more, the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus marks a return to form for Intel desktop processors.” Read our review.
After the disappointing original Arrow Lake launch, the 270K Plus is one of the best CPUs Intel has made in years. This processor’s relatively low price has much to do with its appeal, but there are plenty of other reasons to consider this chip. Not the least of which is the fact it currently comes with two free games, Tomb Raider Legacy of Atlantis and Star Wars Galactic Racer, the total value of which equates to $119.
The 270K Plus is very close in specification to the Core Ultra 9 285K, mirroring the latter’s 24 cores and threads and rocking similar respective boost clocks of 4.7GHz and 5.5GHz across its E-cores and P-cores. However, less visible changes, such as a 900MHz boost to die-to-die interconnect speeds, and others, help elevate performance to new heights, particularly in games.
Just take a look at the Cinebench 2026 scores above. Yes, that’s the $255 270K Plus leading the pack in single-core scores, while sitting comfortably between the more-expensive AMD flagship processors, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D and 9950X3D2, with a near-10k multi-core score.
Workstation applications are where the 270K Plus shines brightest. This CPU punches well above its weight in a variety of other benchmarks we’ve tested, including 7-Zip and Y-cruncher, in part thanks to its native support for higher RAM speeds.
While the initial batch of Core Ultra 200 series processors offered frankly awful value when it came to gaming, the 270K Plus thankfully addresses this shortfall. Now, Intel is keeping pace with similarly priced AMD processors, giving way only to its rival’s more-expensive 3D V-Cache options.
For example, there’s a large 11.4% gap between the 270K Plus and an X3D CPU in Total War: Warhammer III, but this shrinks to 8% in Rainbow Six Siege. It’s also important to consider that these 3D V-Cache CPUs are much more expensive than the 270K Plus at its current price, making these advantages relatively poor value.
The only reason not to consider the 270K Plus is that it uses Intel’s LGA1851 platform. While it’s a relatively strong processor, there’s unlikely to be much of an upgrade path available to you, as Intel is widely reported to be shifting to a new LGA1954 socket when it releases its next-gen Nova Lake CPUs.
