Watch the AMD Ryzen 5000 Zen 3 livestream here today

YouTube YouTube
Watch On

It's a big day, it's AMD Ryzen 5000 day, and today we'll find out just what Dr. Lisa Su and Co. have planned for the next-gen Zen 3 gaming processors. We're liveblogging the Zen 3 announcement, so check that out for the very latest updates once the show starts.

 The AMD Ryzen 5000 livestream, dubbed 'Where gaming begins', kicks off today at 9am Pacific, 12pm Eastern, or 5pm UK time, and you can watch it live right here.

AMD's popular CEO, Dr. Lisa Su, will be running the event today, along with a select bunch of other senior execs, and will be introducing us to the new Ryzen 5000 lineup, the desktop gaming chips powered by the new Zen 3 CPU architecture.

But what are we expecting to find out about the new processors today? Obviously there should be a firm release date for at least the first Ryzen 5000 CPUs, and hopefully prices too, but we're also likely to see some gaming performance numbers too. 

This new generation of AMD processors is expected to move the game on, both figuratively and literally, because the Zen 3 architecture is promising some serious IPC gains. With a slightly updated 7nm production node, and a new design we could be looking at 10 - 15 percent higher IPC, with some rumours suggesting a 20 percent uplift. 

Cut the cord...

(Image credit: Steelseries)

Best wireless gaming mouse: ideal cable-free rodents
Best wireless gaming keyboard: no wires, no worries
Best wireless gaming headset: top untethered audio

Along with an expected bump in clock speeds that could put the new AMD Ryzen 5000-series CPUs in the driving seat when it comes to gaming performance, and mean the red team has the lead over Intel for the first time in years. Given that's the only place Intel could realistically claim the win, having lost the core-count battle and process node superiority, the Zen 3 chips really could represent a true changing of the gaming guard.

I'd say that Intel will definitely be paying attention. The announcement yesterday that the 11th Gen desktop processors, code-named Rocket Lake, would be launching early in 2021, with Alder Lake also following later in the year, is likely no coincidence of timing ahead of AMD's big announcement.

We've only heard tell of a pair of AMD Zen 3 CPUs so far—the Ryzen 5800X and 5900X—and it's possible those are going to be the first chips to hit the shelves. But there are sure to be more following, a full family to usher in a new era of gaming CPUs. And that starts today. 

Dave James
Editor-in-Chief, Hardware

Dave has been gaming since the days of Zaxxon and Lady Bug on the Colecovision, and code books for the Commodore Vic 20 (Death Race 2000!). He built his first gaming PC at the tender age of 16, and finally finished bug-fixing the Cyrix-based system around a year later. When he dropped it out of the window. He first started writing for Official PlayStation Magazine and Xbox World many decades ago, then moved onto PC Format full-time, then PC Gamer, TechRadar, and T3 among others. Now he's back, writing about the nightmarish graphics card market, CPUs with more cores than sense, gaming laptops hotter than the sun, and SSDs more capacious than a Cybertruck.

Latest in Processors
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang delivering pancakes and sausages to pre-GTC show hosts and guests, wearing an apron
'There might be a party. I wasn't invited,' says Jensen Huang of the rumoured TSMC proposal to join forces and run Intel's chip fabs
Nvidia Feynman GPU
While we despair of RTX 50-series supplies and wait on next-gen Rubin, Nvidia reveals its next-next GPU architecture will be known as Feynman and is due in 2028
Nvidia Vera CPU
Nvidia reveals Vera, a new CPU with 'custom' cores which could be very exciting for its upcoming premium PC processor
Machinery tools and equipment,Rolls of galvanized steel for production metal pipes and tubes for industrial ventilation systems in factory.
New super-thin '2D' metal sheets could enable ultra-low power chips and can you guess how they're made? Yup, by squishing stuff really hard
Aooster's G-Flip 370 mini PC
This palm-sized PC has removable memory, a flip up screen, and a Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor
Texas Instruments MSPM0C1104 tiny chip
World's smallest microcontroller looks like I could easily accidentally inhale it but packs a genuine 32-bit Arm CPU
Latest in News
Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer still - woman in the front seat of a car, looking out the back window while holding a wad of cash
The specter of a GTA 6 delay haunts the games industry: 'Some companies are going to tank' if they guess wrong, says analyst
Image for
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide’s getting a new roguelite wave defense mode that sounds a whole lot like a souped-up take on Killing Floor
Battle Brothers
Nearly 2 years after its last update, the excellent Battle Brothers gets 'a bucket load of fixes' and free new content
Western outlaws with masks and guns
'Players don't explore': former Grand Theft Auto 6 and Red Dead Online designer lays out the perils of 'open world fatigue'
Person battling bizarre four-eyed monster with stylish UI elements surrounding them
Persona and Metaphor: ReFantazio's UI designer is open to accessibility options for players who find the stylish menus overstimulating: 'That is something we understand we'll need to work on and provide in the future'
Split Fiction screenshot
Split Fiction is reportedly at the center of a bidding war for its movie rights