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Intel's i5 14400 and Ryzen 5 5600 are both attractive budget-gaming CPU options in 2024. Intel's i5 14400 retails at $199, while Ryzen's 5600 goes for around $129. They can be paired with most high-performing GPUs to handle any modern AAA title. Since gaming is more focused on single-core performance, the clock speeds they offer are decent enough to pull through any tough gaming scenarios.
The 5600 version is a better choice over the 5600X because both offer the same performance and technically you are just paying $30 extra for better overclocking capabilities. According to us, it is not worth it. However, the i5 13400 would be a better choice over the i5 14400 because it sells for $30 less than the latter. The newer gen i5 14400 adds only one-to-five FPS in games.
We will compare the two CPUs based on their actual gaming performance. This comparison will help you go for the chip that suits your needs. There is a $70 difference in the price of these CPUs, so let's see if that extra cash brings significant performance difference to the table.
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Note: Some parts of this article are subjective and solely reflect the writer's opinion.
Should you go for the Ryzen 5 5600 over the Intel i5 14400?
Intel's i5 belongs to the Raptor Lake Refresh series which uses a 10 nm fabrication process. The Ryzen 5 5600, despite being two years older than the i5 CPU, uses the 7 nm fabrication process. This means that the AMD chip is more efficient at intensive workloads.
Let's look at a detailed comparison of the specs of these two CPUs.
Specs comparison
There's no major difference between the specs of the two CPUs. They have the same core count considering the E cores on the i5 14400 won't be contributing to gaming performance. The Ryzen 5 goes up to 4.4 GHz, which is nearly same as the i5's 4.7 GHz. The advantage that the i5 14400 holds is the DDR5 RAM support, which significantly helps gaming performance.
However, if you decide to build a budget gaming build, then you won't be looking towards the DDR5 RAM because they come more expensive than the DDR4 RAM kits. Though DDR5 is the current gaming norm, DDR4 is plenty powerful for any gaming scenario even in 2024. But if you wish to add DDR5 RAM to your rig, then the Ryzen 5 5600 is strictly a no-go, buy the Intel i5 14400.
Performance comparison
Now comes the most important part - gaming performance. These CPUs are strictly recommended for users to want to build a budget-gaming build since they are not very good at handling productivity related tasks. Since gaming uses the GPU more, these CPUs are still a valid budget purchase in 2024.
So, we won't be giving any synthetic benchmarking scores between the two CPUs. If you are building a rig that can game well and equally handle intensive productivity, look for a more core-heavy CPU; six cores aren't enough to handle modern workloads. Let's look at the gaming benchmarks of the two CPUs.
As these numbers suggest, the i5 14400 offers 10% to 20% better performance than the Ryzen 5 5600. The DDR5 memory support comes in as a major performance multiplier for the Intel chip.
Ryzen 5 5600 vs Intel i5 14400: Final take
Well, there is no clear winner between the two. The i5 14400 beats the Ryzen 5 5600 by a good 20% margin. However, that doesn't make it a winner. It costs $70 more than the Ryzen chip, and a 20% increment isn't enough for that much markup.
A better alternative we can suggest is the i5 13400 CPU. It retails at $166, which is only $37 more than the Ryzen 5 5600 but performs the same as the i5 14400. So, you are going to get the same 15%-20% improvement by just paying $30 extra, and here the price markup is completely justified.
