Best Motherboards

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Best Intel X99 Motherboards

This page contains our recommendations for motherboards with Intel's high-end LGA-2066 socket and X299 chipset supporting the X-Series and Extreme line of processors. Our recommendations for motherboards supporting Intel's mainstream LGA-1151 sockets are found on the previous page. Skip to the next page for all AMD-based boards.

If you’re not sure which chipset you’re after, or have more basic questions, you can visit our motherboard basics and motherboard buying guide stories to help narrow down your board buying options.

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Best Intel LGA 2066 Motherboards

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Best Intel X299 Motherboards

EATX

MSI X299 XPower Gaming AC

Pros
  • Extreme memory bandwidth exceeds all competitors
  • Good overclocking
  • Four-way SLI and CrossFire compatible
  • Supports three M.2 drives via CPU lanes with included adapter
Cons
  • Poor efficiency at CPU defaults
  • Oversized 10.7” depth requires special case consideration
  • Troublesome RGB control software without firmware-based option
Verdict

If you’re in the market for a 3-way CrossFire or SLI rig and also want three M.2 drives served at x4 mode by the CPU, competitors leave you little choice but to buy MSI’s X299 XPower Gaming AC.

3.5/5
$424Newegg

ATX

ASRock Fatal1ty X299 Professional Gaming i9

Pros
  • Superb price savings on expensive 10GbE solution
  • Retained controllers from cheaper model make this a Triple Ethernet plus Wi-Fi solution
  • Good CPU overclocking
  • Great DRAM overclocking
  • Adds new-generation USB 3.1 front-panel header
Cons
  • Included 433Mb/s Wi-Fi is half as fast as competitors
  • Fewer slot configuration options than closest competitor
  • Extremely basic RGB
Verdict

Buyers who hate well-lit boards and love 10GbE will find exceptional value in the Fatal1ty X299 Professional Gaming i9 motherboard. Buyers who hate well-lit boards and don’t care about 10GbE can save $100 with ASRock’s X299 Taichi, which is based on the same PCB.

4/5
$398Newegg

ASRock X299 Taichi

Pros
  • Great overclocking
  • Good efficiency
  • Dual Gigabit Ethernet plus Wi-Fi
  • Three M.2 NVMe slots with one fed directly by the CPU
Cons
  • Wi-Fi module is lower model than competing products
  • No SLI support on Kaby Lake-X
Verdict

The X299 Taichi’s CPU-fed M.2 slot is likely the biggest competitive advantage of the three LGA 2066 motherboards tested thus far. Though the way its extra M.2 slot is connected precludes SLI when used with Kaby Lake-X, the X299 Taichi is cheap enough to offset the cost of a Skylake-X CPU upgrade.

4/5
$289Newegg

Gigabyte X299 Aorus Gaming 7

Pros
  • Solid CPU Overclocking
  • Upscale Wi-Fi and secondary Ethernet controllers
  • Upscale audio components
  • Elaborate, fully-functional RGB lighting
  • Extra M.2 and four-lane PCIe slot
Cons
  • Extra M.2 and PCIe slot share lanes
  • No 0x AVX offset available on published firmware
  • Mediocre memory overclocking
  • Poor energy efficiency
Verdict

Had the X299 Aorus Gaming 7 included a Thunderbolt 3 controller, it would have easily won a higher award. Were we more concerned with energy efficiency, the X299 Aorus Gaming 7 wouldn’t have won any award. The X299 Aorus Gaming 7’s upscale components are probably worth the extra money for many buyers.

3.5/5
$370Newegg

Gigabyte X299 Aorus Gaming 3

Pros
  • Good Performance
  • Good CPU overclocking
  • Excellent overclocked DRAM bandwidth
  • Low Price
Cons
  • Bottom slot disabled with 28-lane processors
  • Mediocre O/C data rate
  • Mediocre efficiency
  • Does not include HB-SLI Bridge
Verdict

Gigabyte’s X299 Aorus Gaming 3 is a solid performer and a good value for $280 or less. It does sacrifice a few features, like extra networking controllers, to reach this price point, however.

3.5/5
$329Amazon

Mini-ITX

ASRock X299E-ITX/ac

Pros
  • The only X299 Mini-ITX consumer motherboard
  • Good overall performance
  • Great overall efficiency
  • Surprisingly high overclocks
  • Skylake-X requirement provides two M.2’s via CPU PCIe
Cons
  • No 110mm M.2 card support
  • Connecting third M.2 slot to PCH excludes RAID 5 via VROC
  • Only six total I/O-panel USB ports, and four of those share bandwidth
  • No voltage regulator temperature reporting
  • No Kaby Lake-X support
Verdict

The only consumer Mini-ITX motherboard for LGA 2066 becomes our only choice for these builds. Users who are certain that they have sufficient airflow over the voltage regulator will be very pleased with its overclocking capabilities, and those less certain should add a monitoring device.

3.5/5
$389Newegg

MORE: How To Choose A Motherboard

MORE: All Motherboard Content

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Summary
  1. Best Intel LGA 1151 Motherboards
  2. Best Intel X99 Motherboards
  3. Best AMD Motherboards
About the author
Thomas Soderstrom

Thomas Soderstrom is a Senior Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware US. He tests and reviews cases, cooling, memory and motherboards.

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37 comments
Comment from the forums
    Your comment
  • abryant
    Archived comments are found here: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-3753289/motherboards.html
  • tomasf
    Is there any mobo with Thunderbolt 3 that you can recommend?
  • roy.a.dejesus
    What's considered the best/smallest mini-itx mb and case combo for the Ryzen5 2400G? No discrete vc will be used. I want this to be as transportable as possible.
  • rettinger
    The Biostar X370 newegg link says that it's out of stock and may not be restocked. So, I'm not sure that's a helpful suggestion.
  • Soaptrail
    Are AMD 470 motherboards not mass produced yet? Not one is on this list.
  • tyrii
    Hi Thomas,
    There seems to be mistake on the pricing of the Asus ROG Strix Z370-G Gaming or the $80 price tag is for another motherboard.
  • thalian
    1. The above comment is correct. I only WISH the Asus ROG Strix Z370-G Gaming mobo was available for $80!!! That link actually goes to Amazon's listing for the previous board: ASRock H370M PRO4 .
    2. Why no other boards priced under $200? And why only 6 Intel mainstream LGA-1151 boards? There's a ton of them out there and there have to be more than 6 that are good to use.
  • tazmo8448
    Yeah I'd like to see the AMD X470 boards reviewed too...as per Soaptrails post.
  • dahenger
    AMD X470 please.
  • Jungstar
    No full size b450 of b350 nor micro atx boards???
  • Frederic Jeanbart
    Best X299... For Gaming. Ok. Now, when will there be a serious article for such high end motherboards that actually aren't made for gaming but rather content creation, engineering, etc.?
  • kep55
    I agree with Frederic Jeanbart. I use my old Gigabyte MA770-UD3 based unit for work not wasting time. How about some info on work and mainstream mobos?
  • Frederic Jeanbart
    Why don't you update this list, instead of solely modifying its date so as to make it look recent ? There are newer mobo on the X299 block...
  • Tanyac
    Your data on the MSI XPower Gameing AC is incorrect.
    The board has 2 x Intel GBe LAN ports, not one.
    There are 3 motherboard mounted M.2 Slots. The firsts two come from the chipset, not the CPU. The third is from the CPU. The M.2 expander card anables you to connect another two M.2 drives via a PCIe slot to the CPU lanes.
  • mhamad.canaan
    what about best Mobo for gaming that also supports generation 9 CPU?
  • vark8
    WTF?! WHY is this missing x470 and b450?! Ppl are still buying 3 series?? I thought we have moved on to the 4 series???
  • comedichistorian
    Asus used to dominate these comparisons but they barely have any representation for Intel and they've completely dropped off the face of the Earth in the X299 category.
  • DotNetMaster777
    Intel Motherboards family seems to be good enough for this price !!
  • rolli59
    Strange to only have mITX B450 board! I am sure most gamers are after ATX solution.
  • dennphill
    I am with Jungstar...I don't see any B350 or B450 mATX boards. (I got the title, 'Toms Best Motherboards for 2019 by Socket and Chipset.' You need to add: '...and by form factor.' Thanks, anyway.
  • Soaptrail
    Thanks for the update but 2 out of 4 AMD boards are not ATX size, interesting. Hopefully both these small boards have full size ATX variants.
  • g-unit1111
    Yeah I was wondering about the ATX size as well. I would think the ROG Strix B450-F would qualify as one of the best ATX B450 boards, if not the best.
  • DMAN999
    I own the Asus ROG Strix B450-F Gaming (with Ryzen 5 2600 and 16 GB G.Skill TridentZ RGB 3200) and I am very happy with it.
    It has every feature I needed and I got it for a Great price ($90).
    The MSI B450 Gaming PRO Carbon AC was the other MB I considered when putting this build together, it rated very well in quite a few reviews.
  • fraserlawrence
    Hi Tomshardware editors and readers, I would very much appreciate some guidance on how to improve my new system. I am currently looking at the motherboard options for Ryzen 3700x vs i7-9700k. My current system is totally built off your recommendations in 2014 and has been working wonderfully, thank you all so much! I recently upgraded my gtx 970 to a 2070 super, and now my 4 core i-5 4690K OC to 4.4 Ghz is causing some stuttering and slowdowns in Far Cry 5 and AC Odyssey. I'm deciding between Ryzen 3700x and an i-7 9700k, and the cost of the ram, motherboard, and cooler may help sway me in one direction or another.
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