AMD Ryzen 5000 Mobile CPUs bring high performance, battery life to laptops

You'll soon be able to harness Ryzen 5000-series processor power in productivity and gaming laptops.

What you need to know

• AMD announced today at CES 2021 new Ryzen 5000 H- and U-series Mobile processors for laptops.
• These processors are expected to begin hitting the laptop market February 2021 in 150 different systems.
• AMD also announced new reduced-TDP versions of the desktop-class Ryzen 9 5900X and Ryzen 7 5800X for pre-built PCs only.
• AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO CPUs will now be available to purchase directly through select retailers.

Coming off of a successful unveiling of the Ryzen 5000 series of desktop processors (CPU) in October 2020, AMD is today following up with Ryzen 5000 H- and U-series Mobile processors based on the "Zen 2" and "Zen 3" architectures.

Announced at CES 2021, these CPUs pad AMD's already-impressive lineup of 7nm chips and are expected to begin hitting markets February 2021. Whereas AMD Ryzen 3000 Mobile CPUs were available in 70 systems and Ryzen 4000 Mobile in 100 systems, AMD Ryzen 5000 Mobile is expected to be available in about 150 systems.

The Ryzen 5000 Mobile CPUs are split up into H-series and U-series designations, with the former focusing on creators and gamers and the latter focusing on thin, light notebooks with long battery life. Let's take a look first at the H-series chips.

AMD Ryzen 5000 H-series

AMD's Ryzen 5000 H-series includes eight different processors, all with either six or eight cores and all based on the Zen 3 architecture. They range from the Ryzen 5 5600HS with six cores, 12 threads, and a 35W TDP, all the way up to the beastly Ryzen 9 5980HX with eight cores, 16 threads, and a 45W+ TDP. Compared to Ryzen 4000 Mobile, there are some additional CPUs in the lineup, including the Ryzen 9 5980HS and the Ryzen 9 5980HX (which is a new unlocked version). These processors are aimed at delivering stellar performance in a portable form factor.

The Ryzen 9 5980HS beats out the Intel Core i9-10980HK in Cinebench R20 single- and multi-thread scores, while the Ryzen 9 5980HX is unlocked for overclocking and beats out the Intel Core i9-10980HK handily in a number of tests. Considering the performance gap we already saw with Ryzen 4000 Mobile H-series CPUs, these should prove to be quite potent in gaming laptops. It's even stated that the Ryzen 9 5980HX will be able to handle 4K gaming at high setting with relative ease.

AMD Ryzen 5000 U-series

Also included in the Ryzen 5000 Mobile reveal are five new U-series CPUs based on Zen 2 and Zen 3 architecture. They range from the Zen 2 Ryzen 3 5300U with four cores and eight threads, up to the Zen 3 Ryzen 7 5800U with eight cores and 16 threads. All U-series CPUs have a 15W TDP and 7nm node.

These U-series processors have a focus on battery life and performance, and in fact AMD now can claim to have the only eight-core x86 processor designed for ultrathin laptops. With the Ryzen 7 5800U, AMD is claiming up to 17.5 hours of general usage battery life, going up to 21 hours of movie playback. And don't expect wimpy performance to boost battery life. Compared to Ryzen 4000 counterparts, the Ryzen 5000 CPUs show a significant performance boost in multi-threaded performance in Cinebench R20.

We can also see how the Ryzen 7 5800U compares against the formidable Intel Core i7-1165G7 when it comes to PCMark benchmarks, tying or besting performance results across the board.

Also announced during AMD's CES 2021 keynote were two reduced-TDP versions of the desktop-class Ryzen 9 5900X and Ryzen 7 5800X CPUs. These chips will be found only in pre-built systems and will have a more power-efficient 65W TDP.

Finally, AMD announced that its Ryzen Threadripper PRO CPUs will now be available to buy directly through retailers worldwide. This is great news for those who require robust workstation performance. AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su also showed off for the first time a third-gen AMD EPYC CPU known as "Milan," intended for servers.