The Intel Core i5-x400(F) processors have always offered great performance at competitive pricing—especially in recent years the low absolute cost made them attractive, compared to AMD, who want to sell you only their higher-priced models. The Core i5-13400F in this review currently costs $200, AMD doesn't offer any Zen 4 CPU at or near that price point, their lowest-priced CPU is the Ryzen 7 7600 for $230.

When Intel launched their 13th Gen non-K processors we were surprised that only the Core i7 and Core i9 models are based on the Raptor Lake die, with Raptor Cove cores, the other models are Alder Lake. While Raptor Cove has 2 MB of L2 cache per P-Core, Alder Lake comes with 1.25 MB only. The 13400F in this review can either be based on Alder Lake or Raptor Lake, there's two shipping variants that can be distinguished by their S-Spec number (C0 / SRMBN and B0 / SRMBG). B0 is the Raptor Lake variant, but it's cut down to end up with a configuration that matches the Alder Lake model exactly, so there's no point in trying to find a Raptor Lake version of 13400F and hoping for more cache or performance. This also means that we can expect quite a performance gap between the higher-end "true" Raptor Lake models and the Alder Lake dies in 13th gen.

Intel has integrated "performance" and "efficiency" cores in their processor lineup for two generations, the 13400F now has four E-Cores on-board, which brings the total thread count to 16, resulting in a significant increase over the 12400F which is a classic six-core design, with twelve threads and no E-Cores. Even though the E-Cores are clocked lower and offer lower IPC, having 33% more threads will definitely make a difference, especially in application workloads.

Averaged over our huge list of application tests we find the Intel Core i5-13400F a very decent 14% faster than the 12400F. In the most demanding workloads we even see a 20+% gap, while single-threaded is only 5% improved, mostly due to the higher clock frequencies. Compared to the i9-11900K flagship from two generations ago, the 13400F offers better application performance—impressive. This market segment is pretty crowded though, for example the Core i7-12600K comes at similar pricing as the 13400F, but offers a 10% performance improvement, using the same core counts, with higher clocks. In highly threaded workloads the difference is even bigger. AMD's Ryzen 7 5800X is a classic 8c/16t design that sells for roughly the same amount of money as the 13400F ($240 vs $200), the 13400F can even beat that, with a small 2% margin. The same is true for the 5800X3D, which is awesome in gaming, but can't impress as much in applications, because its larger cache barely makes a difference in apps. Last but not least we have AMD's Ryzen 5 7600, which is a bit more expensive than the 13400F, too, and roughly matches it in performance.

Next up, gaming performance. Here the 13400F isn't nearly as impressive as its bigger brothers from the Raptor Lake lineup. For example, the 13600K is 22% faster at 1080p, the 13900K is even 30% faster—these are huge differences for gaming. Compared to the 12th Gen Core i5-12400F the 13400F can achieve a 3% performance uplift, which is much lower than the gen-over-gen deltas that we've seen on the other Raptor Lakes (13900K: +13%, 13700K: 14.4%, 13600K: +14.7%). These double-digit gaming performance gains that made Raptor Lake so interesting for gamers are missing on the 13400F, probably due to lack of L2 cache, 1.25 MB vs 2 MB per core as mentioned before. This doesn't mean that 13400F is bad at gaming, it's still a formidable gaming processor, especially considering its price. It is able to beat all of AMD's Zen 3 offerings, with the exception of the 5800X3D. It's also pretty competitive against the Zen 4 Ryzens, which are a bit faster though, especially at lower resolutions. At 4K the differences shrink, because most of the bottleneck is with the GPU, but here, too, the 13400F is closer to Alder Lake than to Raptor Lake. This is a bit disappointing for gamers who hoped for the awesome power of Raptor Lake at an affordable $200 price point.

Energy cost is higher today than ever before, and it looks like the times of cheap power are over. That's why energy efficiency is important. It not only reduces your power bill, but it also ensures your room doesn't heat up as much during extended gaming sessions, and your carbon footprint will be lower, too. Intel has configured the 13400F with a 65 W TDP (PL1). For short durations the processors can exceed that limit and run at up to 148 W (PL2), which helps with performance in many scenarios, because a lot of applications require CPU performance in bursts, responding to user input, and sit idle most of the time. Running at lower power limit allows Intel to run at a lower voltage, too, which operates the processor closer to its maximum efficiency point. The 13400F is one of the most energy-efficient CPUs we ever tested. In all our tests, single-threaded, multi-threaded, gaming, it's very close to the top of the efficiency charts, very nice. This helps score points against Ryzen 7600, 5800X and Core i5-12600K, which are all considerably less power efficient, often sipping twice the power of the 13400F.

These low power requirements also mean lower heat output, which makes 13400F really easy to cool. We measured only 49°C during our thermal benchmark, which is one of the lowest heat levels we've ever seen in this test. If you're building a small form factor system, definitely consider the 13400F, it offers amazing performance for its heat output. Intel includes a stock cooler with the 13400F, which is totally sufficient.

Intel has a long history of locking features on lower-end SKUs, and not much has changed with Raptor Lake. While AMD gives you free unlocked multipliers on all models, Intel wants you to pay up for that capability gated behind the "K"-suffix. Features are also segmented by chipset. For example, you can't overclock the memory on the cheaper H610 chipset, which also doesn't give you a CPU-attached M.2 NVMe slot even though the processor supports it technically. Back during 12th gen days you could overclock the locked processors on a motherboard with external clock generator—Intel has shut that capability down for 13th gen. What you can still do is remove the power limit, which actually makes a surprisingly small difference in both performance and power. The highest power draw we've seen is 86 W in Blender, it seems the 6+4 core config isn't as power hungry as the higher-end models in 13th Gen.

With a retail price of $200, the Core i5-13400F is priced pretty competitively in the current processor landscape. It's a good deal cheaper than the Ryzen 7600 ($230), which is AMD's lowest-priced Zen 4 offering. The Zen 4 AM5 platform also suffers from high motherboard cost, and the requirement that you have to use DDR5. For Intel 12th and 13th Gen processors you may opt for a DDR4 motherboard, which means memory is cheaper, but you're also losing on a bit of performance. Still, if you only have X dollars, then Zen 4 will often be out of range for what you can afford, even if it offers better performance. Strong competition comes from AMD's aging Zen 3 platform, which is more affordable than even Intel DDR4, because you can use the oldest, cheapest motherboards from several years ago with the most recent Zen 3 processors, thanks to AMD's impressive compatibility on that platform. A surprising alternative is the Intel Core i5-12600K, which is from the previous generation and thus heavily discounted, to $210 currently. In terms of core config the 12600K and the 13400F are identical, but the 12600K runs higher clocks across the board and it supports overclocking thanks to the K suffix—at just a $10 difference, a no-brainer. If your focus is gaming, especially with a high-end GPU, then it might be worth it to invest another $90 for a 13600K, which offers much better gaming performance thanks to being a real Raptor Lake design. On the other hand, $90 vs $200 is a 45% increase in pricing, no way you're getting that much of an FPS increase. Overall, the 13400F is an excellent CPU that doesn't break the bank and is very competitive to the alternatives.