What is AMD Ryzen?

History

In 2016, AMD posted its balance sheet that showed a loss for its fourth consecutive year. However, annual sales were up from the previous year and hit $4.2 billion, much of that from its system-on-a-chip technology used in both Sony PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox consoles.

In March 2017, it released the Ryzen line of desktop and notebook processors, replacing the Athlon and Opteron product lines. Ryzen's new architecture, named Zen, was a complete departure from its old server products.

Ryzen earned immediate praise from testers and reviewers, particularly gamers. Its significant leap in performance compared to its prior generation made it equal to or, in some cases, better than the best from Intel. It also cost less.

Over the years, AMD has revised its Zen architecture, refreshing the Ryzen product line to match the upgrades, improving performance, core count, memory management and other functions.

Consumers responded positively to the changes. AMD had a 7% market share in the desktop and notebook space in 2017. By 2024, it had climbed to more than 30%, according to Statista.

Releases

The first generation of Ryzen processors appeared in the first quarter 2017. The 1000 series featured up to eight cores and 16 threads, with a 52% increase in instructions per cycle compared to Athlon.

The Ryzen 2000 series, released in April 2018, included a slightly updated Zen microarchitecture named Zen+. Performance proved roughly 10% faster than the prior generation, with a specific emphasis on addressing memory and cache latency.

Ryzen's third-generation processors, based on AMD's Zen 2 architecture, launched July 7, 2019. Average performance was 50% faster, and floating-point operations performance doubled. More importantly, this was the first generation of Ryzen chips built with the multi-chip module, or chiplet package. Instead of one large piece of silicon with 16 cores, this design incorporated four smaller chips, each with four cores, connected by a high-speed interconnect.

In June 2020, AMD shipped its first processor in the XT line, its fastest high-performance processor. The Ryzen 3000XT series processors featured increased boost clocks and other small performance enhancements compared to the 3000X processors.

Months later, in October 2020, AMD announced the availability of new Ryzen processors built on the Zen 3 architecture. These chips offered a 19% improvement in inter-process communication compared to Zen 2-based chips at a clock speed of more than 5 gigahertz.

The Ryzen 6000 mobile-only series processors, released Jan. 4, 2022, employed the Zen 3+ core, delivering modest performance improvements and increased power efficiency.

The Ryzen 7000 series for desktops, highlighting the new Zen 4 core at its September 2022 debut, produced a nearly 30% improvement in single-thread performance. This series also featured a brand new AM5 socket and used DDR5 -- short for Double Data Rate 5 -- memory.

In January 2024, AMD introduced the 8000 series, which supported performance gains across the central processing unit (CPU) and integrated graphics processing unit (GPU) as well as the addition of an AI neural processing unit, enabling client-side AI capabilities for improved productivity, efficiency and collaboration. The integrated graphics delivered 1080p -- short for progressive scan -- gaming resolution that previously required a discrete GPU.

Finally, whenever Intel presented a new generation of processors, the company normally required a new motherboard. However, AMD preserved backwards compatibility in some instances, so new chips could be added into old motherboards. This feature provided owners performance improvements with minimal expense.

There are currently eight generations of Zen processors and only five generations of sockets due to the backward compatibility of certain Ryzen chips.

Product lineup

AMD's Ryzen product names are designed to provide full information about each CPU's performance tier, generation and features. The typical AMD Ryzen processor name is several digits and ends with a letter. Each appears using the following format: Ryzen X YYYYZ0suffix.

• X is the performance series, or tier. It is one of four numbers -- 3, 5, 7 or 9 -- and performance is measured in ascending order. Therefore, Ryzen 3 is entry level, with the slowest clock speed and fewest cores, while Ryzen 5 is mid-range, Ryzen 7 is high end, and Ryzen 9 is the top of the line.
• The four-digit YYYY number indicates the generation of the processor. The 1000 series was the first generation, while the 3000 series was the first generation of Zen 2 architecture. There was a refresh to Zen 1 named Zen+. The same thing happened with Zen 2, so the 5000 series is based on the Zen 3 architecture.
• The Z number refers to the processor's design.
• There is always a 0 at or near the end of the designation, almost always followed by a letter suffix. An XT, such as the 7900XT, is the highest-performance processor with the fastest clock speed, followed by an X designation, as in the 5600X. No suffix, such as the 3900, indicates the most basic performance.
• A suffix of G means the CPU has an integrated GPU. The integrated GPU offers considerably less performance than a dedicated, discrete GPU. Still, for basic Windows use, it is sufficient. U as a suffix designates ultra-low power models found in laptops. A suffix of T indicates a power-optimized model designed to run at lower power and thermal levels. It's used in embedded system processors.
• In 2024, AMD introduced a new product line with the X3D suffix, indicating processors with three-dimensional caching for increased performance. These processors, costing more than $1,000, almost exclusively attract high-performance gamers.

Additionally, AMD developed a very high-end desktop processor named Threadripper. Its first generation had 16 cores. Its fourth generation, Threadripper 7000, released in late 2023, included up to 96 cores -- considerably more than an average desktop processor.

Marketed to high-end developers and content creators, the chip has no integrated graphics and a much larger L1, L2 and L3 cache, along with many more Peripheral Component Interconnect Express lanes for rapid data movement.

Best uses for Ryzen

Ryzen is more than suitable for general-purpose computing. There is little difference between it and Intel's entry-level processor.

Ryzen is widely acknowledged by reviewers and gaming enthusiasts as better overall for video games. Intel and AMD have battled neck and neck in this field as processor generations have passed for each. But ultimately, gaming performance is mostly dependent on the GPU, not the CPU.

However, Ryzen's gaming performance does have a business application: content creation. The same processing instructions that speed up a game also render video or process audio more quickly. The Threadripper in particular, with its dozens of cores, shines in areas of content creation and compiling application code, explaining its popularity with developers and content creators.

Ryzen vs. Intel

There are structural differences in the brands' designs, but they have little effect on everyday use. However, the AMD processor is likely to cost $50 to $100 less than its Intel equivalent.

Advanced benchmarking is the only way to compare performance among the rivals. For basics like web browsing or using Excel, there's little difference between the latest processors and five-year-old desktop processors. Plus, overall performance is determined by other elements of the system, including memory, storage type and networking.

Many users report that AMD processors become hot under heavy load, as do Intel processors. A hot laptop can be uncomfortable for its user. Desktops require more aggressive cooling, such as an all-in-one water cooling system.