Intel’s Core Ultra Series 3 “Panther Lake” processors are set to roll out across a broad range of laptops in 2026, bringing notable gains in efficiency and a dramatic leap in integrated graphics performance powered by the new Xe3 architecture. At CES 2026, I had hands-on time with several games and benchmarks to see what this latest integrated GPU can deliver—and it’s clear these chips could reshape Intel’s gaming trajectory, and potentially the wider PC gaming landscape.
The Core Ultra Series 3 lineup, especially the flagship Core Ultra X9 388H equipped with 12 Xe3 graphics cores, delivers a level of gaming performance previously unseen from Intel silicon. Based on my testing, that leap is immediately apparent. Paired with Intel’s revamped upscaling technology, Xe Super Sampling (now branded as XeSS 3), I experienced smooth, responsive gameplay even in demanding titles like Cyberpunk 2077. Taken together, Intel’s advances in integrated graphics signal a potentially transformative moment for PC gaming.
Hands-On With Panther Lake: High FPS Without a Discrete GPU
I had two sessions with the Panther Lake chips at CES: The first day’s experience included live gameplay, and the next was benchmarking-focused. Between the two, I played, watched, and collected test results for several modern games running solely on these chips. My top-level takeaway is that Panther Lake chips make smooth (and even high-refresh) gaming in modern titles possible without a discrete GPU, especially via XeSS 3.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
Across titles like Battlefield 6, Cyberpunk 2077, and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, I saw frame rates much higher than with any past Intel silicon. While the baseline is playable (a success in its own right), XeSS 3 can carry these titles into high-frame-rate-gaming territory (more on the importance and implementation of XeSS in the next section).
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
During the gameplay session, I spent most of my time playing and observing Battlefield 6. Intel set up one system—a Lenovo IdeaPad Pro 5 with a Core Ultra X9 388H chip with an Arc B390 IGP (which contains the new Xe3 cores) and 32GB of system memory—as the central gameplay station, outputting to a TV so the gathered press group could watch.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
I played the game at 1080p with the balanced visual preset and XeSS set to ultra performance. The first day wasn’t a benchmarking session to gather hard numbers. Still, with the visual performance monitor persistent in the upper left corner, Battlefield 6 sat between 160 and 210 frames per second (fps) during my play session—mainly in the 180 to 190fps range. The frame rate would dip when the action got frantic and rise in smaller, darker spaces; that much variance may irritate some, but it stayed within a high playable range.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
Battlefield 6 is well-optimized, which helps, and 1080p isn’t a demanding resolution these days. But those numbers are still previously unheard of for Intel graphics processing. While XeSS comes with some visual concessions (more on that next), not all users need more than 150fps; you can dial down the XeSS settings to favor quality over performance.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
I also watched Clair Obscur played on an HP OmniBook X 14 (an Ultra X7 358H with Arc B390) at high settings with XeSS and 4x frame generation active. (This means the processor’s AI hardware generates three new frames for every original frame rendered by the IGP, increasing frame rates.) Frame rates settled between 100 and 130fps most of the time, but fluctuated significantly depending on the environment. In a game heavy on button-press timing and a lot of varied areas, this could impact your experience.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
The second-day benchmarking session provided more specific performance numbers, as we could run the tests ourselves. Our friends at Tom’s Hardware found that the same IdeaPad laptop averaged 81fps in Cyberpunk 2077 (1080p resolution, High settings, Balanced XeSS), 68fps in Baldur’s Gate 3 (1200p, High settings, Quality XeSS), and 109fps in F1 2025 (1080p, High settings, Balanced XeSS).
(Credit: John Burek)
With that information out there, I used my benchmarking time to push the laptop and XeSS 3 to their limits to see what kind of frame rates the platform could achieve in best-case scenarios. With XeSS and Frame Generation 4X enabled in Cyberpunk, the laptop averaged 170fps on the Ultra graphics preset. That’s no mean feat in a demanding game, even if most are “artificial” frames.
(Credit: Kenneth Butler)
Without XeSS on the same test, the laptop averaged 43fps, roughly confirming the 4X boost while clearing the 30fps minimum playability threshold in its own right. On the Ultra graphics preset, that’s not so bad. Intel’s claim that the 12-core chip is roughly in line with an Nvidia RTX 4050 laptop GPU caught our attention, and looking at a past model with this GPU that we tested (the 2025 HP Victus), its 49fps score on the same test is pretty close.
(Credit: Kenneth Butler)
I also ran a quick test on legacy favorite Shadow of the Tomb Raider (1080p, Ultra settings, no XeSS), and the laptop pushed a respectable 82fps. I’ll have to test this more extensively in a full review, and I’m particularly keen to see how more games perform without XeSS. But the early look is enough to say Core Ultra 3 graphics can power your gaming sessions at a range of settings.
(Credit: John Burek)
XeSS 3 Is the Secret Sauce—But It’s Not Perfect
These gains don’t come without caveats. The first caveat: Xe Super Scaling is required to achieve high frame rates, which takes a lower resolution image and uses AI hardware to upscale the picture quality for faster frame rates. Across all brands (Nvidia has DLSS, AMD has FSR), this technology is a divisive topic among gamers. Nvidia’s DLSS 4 (and now 4.5) is more effective at boosting frame rates and retaining visual quality than ever, but many enthusiasts don’t like leaning on the AI enhancements versus traditional rendering.
(Credit: Kenneth Butler)
That goes double for frame generation, which predicts what the next frame will look like and inserts artificial frames between it and the next original rendered one. For some, these “fake” frames don’t count the same as original frames. Nvidia’s RTX 50-series GPUs lean heavily on DLSS to achieve fast frame rates, which has received criticism from hard-core gamers who prefer traditional rendering only.
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To their credit, you’ll notice some ghosting and fuzziness present while using XeSS (DLSS delivers superior quality at this stage in my experience), so their visual quality is not the same as rendered frames. As an enthusiast, I understand, and I turn off upscaling where I can. However, given the choice between slower, mostly sharp frame rates and faster, mostly sharp frame rates in demanding titles, I prefer high-fps gaming while keeping visual settings on high or maximum. This is even more important for low-end systems and integrated graphics gaming: You have to be realistic about what a PC can achieve, and if my choice is between barely playable frame rates or high-fps gaming on a non-gaming laptop, I’m gladly turning on XeSS.
(Credit: John Burek)
Now for the second caveat: Native support for XeSS 3 is growing, but it’s only in about 50 games right now. More games support XeSS 2, which has been around longer, but to achieve the gains we’re seeing with Panther Lake processors, the latest XeSS 3 is required. The quality of implementation also varies widely by game—some look sharp, while others (most notably Cyberpunk 2077) exhibit visible artifacting.
A lack of native support doesn’t mean you’re out of luck, though. Intel’s graphics app is a solution for forcing XeSS 3 and frame generation on during games that don’t support it, though this comes with caveats, too. The graphics application includes an override function that forces XeSS and frame generation (up to 4X the frames) into the targeted application, overriding the game’s own settings.
(Credit: John Burek)
The application is, bluntly, just a bit frustrating to work with. You need to relaunch games for the app’s settings to take effect, making trial-and-error with different graphics settings—not to mention benchmarking—difficult. It also seems to fight with the game for control of the resolution and full-screen mode, particularly when using the performance monitoring overlay.
This was particularly bad with Clair Obscur, as it forced the resolution lower and made collecting scores difficult, but this is a known issue across different graphics providers. The application fought me during Cyberpunk testing, too, forcing the game into a smaller window when trying to run it full-screen. When you need to fiddle with the app to get the settings working as desired, it’s frustrating to run into game-by-game issues like this.
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(Credit: John Burek)
Additionally, while the Intel app mostly overrides a game’s settings, it does rely on them somewhat: You need to enable frame generation within the game, or the override can’t link in and boost them further. On top of all that, you have no reliable way to confirm that the override and 4X frame generation are functioning as intended, other than eyeballing the frame rate and having enough knowledge to know what to expect.
In short, this part of Intel’s ecosystem needs further development. It’s exciting to have it in the first place, and it’s exciting that XeSS has a tangible impact on frame rates—it’s even a plus that an override function exists while native support is added to more titles. But it’s a bit clunky, and I can’t imagine the average user fiddling with these settings until they get it to work.
Panther Lake Redefines What a “Gaming Laptop” Can Be
Frame rate gains and caveats aside, Panther Lake and Xe3 graphics are hype-worthy because they can turn a whole range of laptop types into gaming laptops. Intel nudged toward this with past Iris Xe GPUs—my integrated graphics gaming testing from 2021 showed some decent results—but this is a new level.
From ultraportables to general-use desktop replacements, new-in-2026 laptops with Core Ultra 3 chips and Xe3 graphics will run the latest PC games reasonably well. If you’re a mainstream gamer without a dedicated PC, your new everyday laptop or that fresh personal PC for independent work will fill the role in a pinch.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
Similarly, if you are a gamer but only have a stationary desktop or an especially non-portable gaming laptop, your go-to travel laptop could now run new games well enough to continue your save when you’re away from home.
Of course, a truly smooth experience in cutting-edge titles may require XeSS. But if you’re trying to play on a general-use laptop, do you honestly, truly care? The expectation should be performance concessions on these machines to begin with. If your mainstream laptop is suddenly capable of gaming, it’s hard to see that as anything but a win. While it’s easy to forget in enthusiast spaces, most people don’t own powerful gaming machines.
This is similar to the pro-DLSS argument I’ve made for lower-end systems. Although enthusiasts reserve the right to quibble over visual quality impacts and the lessened focus on rasterized improvements, it’s people who own low-end machines that stand to gain the most. People on tight budgets, single-PC owners, students, and anyone else who just wants to play the latest games smoothly but doesn’t have a powerhouse PC all win in this scenario.
(Credit: Matthew Buzzi)
However, this does require buying a new laptop in 2026 with a potent Intel Core Ultra 3 chip inside—no cheap ask, even if we aren’t exactly sure where most systems’ prices will fall. We’ll also have to see how the whole stack performs, rather than just the top models.
Looking further out, will we see hyper-portable, or even more affordable, gaming laptops with just Intel Xe3 integrated graphics? Either is possible. Regardless, it looks like a whole lot more laptop models will be game-ready in 2026, further broadening the PC gaming audience at any rate. With retail systems set to launch soon, I can’t wait to bring more concrete performance numbers and conclusions to you.
About Our Expert
Matthew Buzzi
Principal Writer, Hardware
Experience
I’ve been a consumer PC expert at PCMag for 10 years, and I love PC gaming. I’ve played games on my computer for as long as I can remember, which eventually (as it does for many) led me to build and upgrade my own desktops to this day. Through my years at PCMag, I’ve tested and reviewed many, many dozens of laptops and desktops, and I am always happy to recommend a PC for your needs and budget.
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