Intel is finally making significant progress with its Lunar Lake processors. As the first laptops hit the shelves, we see Intel waking up from its hibernation that went on for far to long. Both the efficiency and performance of the new series highlight how little Ultra the first generation of Core Ultra actually was.
Intel is delivering on the promises with its processors from the Lunar Lake lineup (Core Ultra Series 2 – 200V). Thank goodness: competition from ARM and Qualcomm with its Snapdragon chips was devastating last year. Manufacturers who chose Intel for their premium laptops were not able to deliver interesting devices. In 2025, Intel promises to be competitive again.
Disappointment
The CPU maker introduced Core Ultra in late 2023. By the time the chips launched, alarms were blaring. Lacking innovation under the hood, Intel’s marketing department seemed to carry the brunt of the responsibility for the perception of progress. What’s in a name? In the case of Core Ultra Series 1, certainly nothing Ultra. Indeed, for the first time in 20 years, measured CPU performance dropped on new devices. Laptop series that historically guaranteed quality and performance dissapointed. The mediocre ThinkPad Carbon X1 powered by Intel Core Ultra 7 165U was the best example.
With Lunar Lake, announced in late 2024, Intel has something to make up for. Core Ultra (Series 2) is supposed to be a radical innovation. Intel is redesigning the architecture of its chips and throwing out multithreading. That sounds dangerous, but it works.
The test of truth
We get to work with an Intel Core Ultra 7 256V and a more powerful Core Ultra 7 268V, processed in a Samsung Galaxy Book 5 Pro and a Dell Pro 14 Plus, respectively. We compare the chip’s performance and efficiency with three previous-generation processors: two from the economical U range and one powerful H chip. For completeness, we also include a Snapdragon Elite processor in the comparison. We will leave AMD’s latest chips out of the equation for this piece.
Let’s look under the hood first. The Intel Core Ultra 7 256V and 268V both have eight computing cores on board, accounting for the same number of threads. Four of the cores are P-cores aimed at performance, the other four cores are clocked lower for efficiency. That none of the cores possess multithreading is unseen in a mainstream Intel laptop chip.
In the first Core Ultra generation, Intel took a completely different approach. Those chips consisted of a very limited amount of classic P cores with multithreading, assisted by efficient E cores without.
Production Process
The manufacturing process is another very important difference. The Lunar Lake chips roll off the line at TSMC and are baked on the 3 nm N3B node. Series 1 did come from an Intel factories and more specifically the Intel 4 node. Intel 4 and TSMC N3B should be equivalent in theory, but in practice TSMC still seems to have an edge. Furthermore, Intel also marketed Core chips without Ultra. Those processors rolled off an Intel 7-band (10 nm).
We briefly list the key specifications of the chips we will be testing:
| Manufacturer | Type | P cores | E cores | Threads | Node | TDP |
| Intel | Core Ultra 256V | 4 (4.8 GHz) | 4 (3.7 GHz) | 4+4 | TSMC N3B | 17 W |
| Intel | Core Ultra 268V | 4 (5 GHz) | 4 (3.7 GHz) | 4+4 | TSMC N3B | 17 W |
| Qualcomm | X1E-78-100 | 12 (3.4 GHz) | Nvt. | 12 | TSMC N4 | 35 W |
| Intel | Core Ultra 7 155H | 6 (4.8 GHz) | 10 (3.8 GHz) | 12+10 | Intel 4 | 28 W |
| Intel | Core 7 150U | 2 (5.4 GHz) | 8 (4 GHz) | 4 + 8 | Intel 7 | 15 W |
| Intel | Core Ultra 7 165U | 2 (4.9 GHz) | 8 (2.1 GHz) | 4 + 8 | Intel 4 | 15 W |
By core and all together
We look first at the results in the Geekbench 5 Pro test. That slightly older benchmark test measures the performance of both individual cores and the entire chip.
We immediately notice some important results. First, the Qualcomm Snapdragon processor remains more powerful than the Intel alternatives in multicore workloads where all cores are fully utilized.
Looking at the performance of individual cores, we notice something different. The P cores in the Lunar Lake processors are the most powerful in the test. They surpass both Qualcomm’s Oryon cores and the cores in the previous generation’s Core Ultra 7, as well as the regular Core 7.
Even more striking is the comparison with the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H. That H-chip is built with performance in mind, in contrast to U-processors of the same generation. Higher power consumption helps with that. Still, both the Core Ultra 7 256V and 268V do better in single threaded workloads.
We repeat the test with the more modern Geekbench 6 benchmark, and see consistent results.
Again, the cores of the new chips score best. The lack of multithreading and the modest amount of P cores plays tricks on the chips in workloads that maximize the use of all cores and threads. Lighter workloads that are not processed by all cores at the same time, the Core Ultra 200 chips can swallow better than anyone else.
That the difference between the Core Ultra 7 256V and 268V is small should not be surprising. The Core Ultra 7 268V’s P-core cores are clocked just slightly higher, but in practice that difference is minimal.
These tests show that Intel gambled well with Lunar Lake and Core Ultra Series 2. The bet on two sets four optimized cores pays off. Especially for slightly lighter workloads, the chips perform very well and even come close to the previous generation’s H-Series.
The previous generation remains behind
In terms of performance, Intel is making a huge leap forward here. We look again specifically at the Core Ultra 7 256V and direct predecessor Core Ultra 7 165U. P-core against P-core we see a 22 percent improvement and in multithreaded scenarios the new chip is even about 26 percent more powerful.
That is striking when you know that the Core Ultra 7 165U has more cores and threads, and is baked on a process that Intel deemed equivalent to TSMC 3 nm. It shows that the architecture of the first-generation Core Ultra simply cannot deliver on its promises. Lunar Lake, with its simpler architecture, does a lot better.
What about the battery?
Performance is one thing, efficiency another. Indeed, with the Snapdragon X Elite series, Qualcomm is betting on an attractive relationship between the two. How efficient are the new chips?
To get some insight into this, we have to be a little leery. Ideally, we would compare devices with exactly the same specifications except for the CPU, but we don’t have those available yet. We are therefore mainly looking for a trend. We run our extensive battery tests on the various laptops, and then offset that result against the battery capacity. The chart below shows the number of minutes of autonomy you get per watt-hour of battery.
Since the specifications of the laptops differ, we mention the screen size in the graph. A larger screen logically requires more from the battery. Keep that in mind when interpreting the results.
We do see that the Qualcomm Snapdragon Elite is still the king of efficiency. Intel, however, is catching up. The most fascinating comparison is between the Intel Core Ultra 7 165U and Core Ultra 268V, both tested in a 14-inch laptop with 32 GB of RAM (the Dell Pro 14 Plus and the Lenovo X1 Carbon Gen 2). The Lenovo’s resolution is a bit higher, though, which negatively affects battery performance.
Tangible progress
Still, we notice the new chips are a lot more efficient. Even the Core Ultra 7 256V in a 16-inch laptop with identical resolution to the Lenovo X1 Carbon offers significantly more minutes of autonomy per watt-hour than its predecessor.
From this we conclude that Lunar Lake makes significantly more efficient use of the laptop battery. You get better computing cores with higher performance, at less power consumption.
No longer a liability
How that translates to real-world performance is harder to analyze with the various laptops we use for these tests. After all, for actual software performance, more than the CPU alone comes into play. RAM memory and SSD speed also have a big impact, as do the thermal capabilities of the devices. Still, one notable result is worth looking at.
The chart above shows a score based on a benchmark of Microsoft Office applications and browsing. The Dell Pro 14 Plus with Intel Core Ultra 7 268V comes out on top in this comparison. This makes it clear that manufacturers armed with the new Intel chips are once again able to build excellent laptops this year that make a palpable leap forward in terms of performance. The Intel CPU is no longer a bottleneck.
We also see a big difference between Samsung’s laptop and Dell’s, despite the similar chips inside. Above all, you can see from this that there is more at play than just the choice of CPU for overall performance.
Intel rejoins the conversation
Initial tests of the Intel Core Ultra 200V chips are clear, though. The first generation of Core Ultra was a liability for laptop manufacturers; the second generation could be an asset again. The chips use a much simpler architecture, and it works.
For workstations, single threaded chips with four P and four E cores are probably not the best option, but for office laptops they seem to offer an excellent balance with high focused performance and efficient battery usage. Intel is not outperforming the competition, but it seems to be keeping up.