Intel CEO Chen Liwu officially confirmed during the company's third quarter 2025 results conference call that the highly anticipated Nova Lake desktop CPU will be released next year. At the same time, he also revealed that the next-generation Panther Lake processor will be officially unveiled at the CES show in January 2026.
According to Chen Liwu, Intel will launch the Core Ultra 200S Plus Arrow Lake Refresh series in early 2026, followed by Nova Lake later in the same year. This Arrow Lake Refresh will bring Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and Core Ultra 7 270K Plus processors. The former is the flagship model, equipped with 24 cores and 36MB L3 cache, and the main frequency is expected to exceed the existing models. The Core Ultra 7 270K Plus is positioned above the Core Ultra 7 265K, with 24 cores, a turbo frequency of up to 5.5GHz, a base frequency of 3.7GHz, and an increased L3 cache to 36MB. According to recent Geekbench benchmark results, its performance is almost the same as the Core Ultra 9 285K, and it performs well in single-core and multi-core tests.
In addition, Chen Liwu confirmed that the first batch of Panther Lake mobile CPUs will be available at the end of this year, and some new models will be released in the first half of next year. Panther Lake uses Intel's 18A process and integrates Cougar Cove performance core, Darkmont energy efficiency core and Xe3 integrated graphics.
After Arrow Lake Refresh and Panther Lake, Intel plans to launch the Nova Lake new processor series in the second half of 2026. Nova Lake will use the new LGA 1954 socket, support up to 52 cores, built-in Xe3 core display, and introduce architectural and software-level optimizations, aiming to regain the market share previously lost to AMD.
Intel will also launch a number of servers and high-end desktop processors based on the 18A process in the next few years, including Diamond Rapids in late 2025/2026, Xeon 6 Plus Clearwater Forest in mid-2026, and the Coral Rapids series released from 2028 to 2029.