Intel Core Ultra 290K Plus, 270K Plus, 250K Plus CPU leak: higher clocks, faster RAM supported

Intel will be unveiling its new Arrow Lake-S Refresh CPUs in 2026, with some new details on the Core Ultra 200K Plus family of processors, and the new naming scheme that includes the Core Ultra 9 290K Plus, Core Ultra 7 270K Plus, and Core Ultra 5 250K Plus processors.

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We've been hearing rumors of Intel's new Arrow Lake-S Refresh processors for a while now, which should act as the last hurrah for the LGA-1851 socket before shifting to the new LGA-1954 socket for the launch of the next-gen Core Ultra 400 series "Nova Lake" desktop CPUs.

Intel's new Arrow Lake-S Refresh processors will include the tweaks and features that the Arrow Lake-S chips got in the form of special boost features and more, as well as some new surprises. The Core Ultra 9 290K Plus succeeds the Core Ultra 9 285K while keeping its 8P+16E CPU core configuration, but increases the Thermal Velocity Boost to 5.8GHz (up from 5.7GHz on the 285K). The E-Core turbo speeds also increase to 4.8GHz, while power limits remain the same at 125W base, and 250W max turbo TDP.

• Read more: Intel rumored to release Arrow Lake Refresh CPUs with higher clock speeds later this year

The company is making bigger changes to its upcoming Ultra 7 and Ultra 5 SKUs of its new Core Ultra 200K Plus processors, with the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus replacing the Core Ultra 7 265K, also retaining its 8P+16E CPU core configuration, the same as the flagship Core Ultra 9 chips. But, the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus will feature higher 5.5GHz Turbo Boost Max clock speeds, and 5.4GHz P-Core Turbo, which is closer to the 265K, but with more CPU cores across the board.

Intel's upcoming Core Ultra 5 250K also receives a CPU core increase with 6P+12E compared to the 6P+8E on the Core Ultra 5 245K, with P-Core Turbo speeds increased to 5.3GHz from 5.2GHz on the 245K, while E-Core speeds stay at 4.7GHz. The same 125W base and 159W max turbo ratings are on the 250K Plus, meaning the additional cores and CPU clocks are given without increasing the power... an interesting move from Intel.

Intel Core Ultra 200K Plus CPU leaks so far:

• Intel Core Ultra 9 285K to Core Ultra 9 290K Plus with 100MHz P-Core increase
• Intel Core Ultra 7 265K to Core Ultra 7 270K Plus with 4 E-Cores
• Intel Core Ultra 5 245K to Core Ultra 5 250K Plus with 100MHz P-Core increase + 4 E-Cores

That's for the new Arrow Lake-S Refresh CPUs themselves, but Intel is providing some other upgrades, with recent CUDIMM memory modules showing Arrow Lake-S speeding up to 9000MT/s in the right conditions. The new Core Ultra 200K Plus CPUs officially support DDR5-7200, compared to DDR5-6400 for the Core Ultra 200 series CPUs on the market today.

It looks as though Intel will NOT be using the same nomenclature for the new processors, as the Core Ultra 9 290K Plus is above the Core Ultra 9 285K, the 270K Plus is next to the 265K, and the 250K Plus joins the 245K. We don't know if Intel will be fully replacing the older processors, or shipping them alongside as higher-end options for LGA-1851 motherboard owners.

We should expect the big reveal in the coming weeks, most likely at CES 2026 in the first week of January, and we'll be on the show floor bringing you the content live.