The Intel Core i9-14900KF, which was once considered one of the best CPUs, has achieved the status of the fastest processor — through overclocking, of course. Chinese overclocker wytiwx (as reported by Uniko's Hardware) has successfully overclocked the Core i9-14900KF to 9,130.33 MHz with liquid helium, thereby establishing a new world record in processor frequency, as officially validated by HWBot.
AMD's FX-series processors were not highly regarded in their time, as they struggled to compete effectively with their Intel counterparts. However, models such as the FX-8150 (codenamed Zambezi) or the FX-8370 (codenamed Vishera) made a name for themselves in the extreme overclocking circles. In fact, the FX-8370 had one of the longest reigns in the processor frequency category.
Finnish overclocker The Stilt had pushed the FX-8370 at 8,722 MHz in 2014, effectively ending the previous FX-8150's two-year reign. The Stilt's FX-8370 had remained at the top for nine long years before the Core i9-13900K (codenamed Raptor Lake) stole its crown in 2023, edging out the Vishera chip by a mere 3 MHz.
The FX-8370 was the last of AMD's dominance in terms of processor frequency. While efforts have been made over the previous couple of years, Zen-based parts didn't have the same overclocking headroom as the FX series. Instead, Intel's Raptor Lake and Raptor Lake Refresh chips have been one-upping each other for the crown.
At 9,130 MHz, the Core i9-14900KF holds the current record, beating the prior record holder, the Core i9-14900KS, by just 13 MHz. Wytiwx pumped 1.388V through the Core i9-14900KF to achieve stability. Since it was cooled with liquid helium, the high voltage didn't phase the Raptor Lake chip.
The Chinese overclocker's other hardware included the Asus ROG Maximus Z790 Apex, a motherboard built for extreme overclockers, a single 32GB Corsair Vengeance DDR5 memory module overclocked to DDR5-5744, a GeForce RTX 3050, and a Corsair HX1200i power supply.
Over the years, we've seen relatively small increments in the clock speed. So, it's safe to say that we may have reached the ceiling of what Raptor Lake and Raptor Lake Refresh can offer and might not see a chip cross the 10 GHz boundary very soon. Intel's latest Core Ultra 200S (codenamed Arrow Lake) series isn't a great overclocker. Nova Lake is slated to arrive next year, so maybe that will change things.
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