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AMD's Ryzen 7 9850X3D tipped for modest price hike — early listings point to $500 list for refreshed Zen 5 CPU

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CES 2026 is right around the corner, which means it might only be a matter of days before we find out the official specs for AMD's new Ryzen 9000 series processors. The company is reportedly planning at least two refreshed X3D SKUs: a dual-cache Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 and a more modest Ryzen 7 9850X3D. We've already seen preliminary product pages for the latter pointing toward a very high $550-600 ask, but tipster @momomo_us has just spotted new listings, suggesting something far more in line with expectations.

In the screenshot above, the Ryzen 7 9850X3D is listed for $511.44, but the MSRP is missing, while both the 7800X3D and 9800X3D have their MSRPs mentioned, which are just a bit lower than their actual price. So, if we take the percentage difference between the two values for either CPU and apply that to the 9850X3D, the MSRP for it would come out to around $499. That's close enough to the $511.44 price currently showing, hinting that a $500 price tag is imminent for this upcoming chip.

As for the processor itself, the 9850X3D shares the same 8-core, 16-thread config as its namesake brethren. Compared to the 9800X3D, it has a 400 MHz higher boost clock, going from 5.2 GHz to 5.6 GHz. Everything else remains the same, including the 96 MB L3 cache (32 MB L3 + 64 MB X3D), and even the power limits. It will reportedly succeed AMD's existing gaming champ and the top choice in our best CPUs roundup — the 9800X3D. That CPU launched at $479, a $30 increment over the previous-gen 7800X3D, so a $500 price tag (or somewhere around that) seems reasonable.

The other X3D chip AMD apparently has in store for CES 2026 is the aforementioned Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 featuring a monstrous 192 MB of L3 cache split across both 8-core CCDs. Compared to the 9850X3D, this CPU is much more elusive, and we have no idea about its price, but it did appear in a couple of early benchmarks recently.

Swipe to scroll horizontally AMD Ryzen 9000 Pricing (unconfirmed) SKU Core Count Cache Clock Speeds TDP MSRP Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 16 Cores / 32 Threads 192 MB L3 + 16 MB L2 4.3 GHz base / 5.6 GHz boost 200W ? Ryzen 9 9950X3D 16 Cores / 32 Threads 128 MB L3 + 16 MB L2 4.3 GHz base / 5.7 GHz boost 170W $699 Ryzen 9 9950X 16 Cores / 32 Threads 64 MB L3 + 16 MB L2 4.3 GHz base / 5.7 GHz boost 170W $599 Ryzen 9 9900X3D 12 Cores / 24 Threads 128 MB L3 + 12 MB L2 4.4 GHz base / 5.5 GHz boost 120W $599 Ryzen 9 9900X 12 Cores / 24 Threads 64 MB L3 + 12 MB L2 4.4 GHz base / 5.6 GHz boost 120W $469 Ryzen 7 9850X3D (rumored) 8 Cores / 16 Threads 96 MB L3 + 8 MB L2 4.7 GHz base / 5.6 GHz boost 120W ? ($500) Ryzen 7 9800X3D 8 Cores / 16 Threads 96 MB L3 + 8 MB L2 4.7 GHz base / 5.2 GHz boost 120W $449 Ryzen 7 7800X3D 8 Cores / 16 Threads 96 MB L3 + 8 MB L2 4.2 GHz base / 5.0 GHz boost 120W $479

Although AMD hasn't officially confirmed either chip, we've seen some hints directly from Team Red. In addition to the leaked shipping manifests that typically make the rounds around new hardware launches, AMD has listed the Ryzen 7 9850X3D in its official driver downloads.

AMD's CES 2026 keynote is scheduled for just under a week from now, with CEO Dr. Lisa Su presenting on Monday, January 5 at 6:30pm PT. If the Ryzen 7 9850X3D is indeed launching soon — and all signs are pointing in that direction — we should hear about it during the keynote address.

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