Intel's hot new handheld gaming chip rumoured to get full-spec Xe3 iGPU with 12 graphics cores

Intel went on record at CES about a planned version of its new Panther Lake chip specifically configured for handheld gaming PCs but didn’t provide any details. Now Videocardz claims the chip will be branded “Intel Core G3 Extreme” and have the same iGPU as Panther Lake in laptops.

That means the Core G3 will get the same 12 Xe3-spec graphics cores as the top-spec Panther Lake chips for laptops. However, the leak claims that some concessions have been made to squeeze Panther Lake into the handheld form factor.

Our first taste of the Intel Arc B390 iGPU at CES was very impressive indeed. (Image credit: Future)

Peak clock speeds for the Performance cores have been reigned in from 5.1 GHz for the Core Ultra X9 388H to 4.7 GHz for the Core G3 Extreme.

That probably all makes sense. For mobile gaming, you’d always want the spec to tilt more towards GPU power than CPU power. Panther Lake’s Efficient cores, likewise, look to be pretty impressive. So, two Performance cores to handle the really demanding CPU threads and another 12 Efficient cores for everything else should be plenty in CPU terms.

For the record, along with the Core G3 Extreme there is also said to be a non-Extreme Core G3. That has an Intel Arc B360 iGPU with the Xe3 core count reduced to 10 and another slight drop in graphics clockspeed to 2.2 GHz. The non-Extreme variant is reported to have the same CPU core counts as the Extreme chip, but a very slightly lower Boost clock of 4.6 GHz.

All told, this looks like a very promising chip for handheld gaming. Andy had a quick go with the laptop version at the CES show and came away very impressed indeed. Long story short, it looks to be a remarkably capable iGPU and well up for 1080p gaming at decent quality settings.

Gaming handhelds based on Intel’s last chip, Lunar Lake, weren’t half bad so the Panther Lake-based Core G3 Extreme could be very nifty indeed. (Image credit: Future)

It should easily have the edge on AMD’s equivalent APU, the not-entirely-new Ryzen AI 400 series also announced at CES. The big questions at this point are therefore not so much peak performance, which looks to be impressive, but driver quality and battery life.

On the former point, Intel claims its driver quality is “light years ahead of where we were a few years ago.” Regarding battery life, well, we’ll just have to wait and see.