The best liquid cooler for your CPU will deliver low temperatures and low noise, allowing you to keep your focus on your game rather than PC's temperature sensors. There are a huge number of all-in-one liquid coolers to choose from today, but we've done the legwork and tested lots of them to pick out the best from the bunch.
The best liquid cooler right now is the indomitable Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro. This all-in-one cooler offers exceptional temperatures and a stellar price tag. Seriously, how has Arctic managed to offer both? You won't find too many frills on the Liquid Freezer III Pro compared to some, but you can pick it up with RGB lighting for a little more money.
If you prefer your PC to be seen but not heard, you'll want to check out the Noctua NL-LC1. It's not only the quietest liquid cooler I've tested, but the best performing one, too. Between this and the Arctic, we're pretty sorted for picks, but I've thrown in one with a screen for anyone into that sorta thing.
For something more affordable, check out our guide to the best air coolers.
Jacob has been professionally slapping liquid coolers onto CPUs for nearly a decade now. All-in-one coolers have come on leaps and bounds in that time. They're quietier, more reliable, and have screens on them. All screens, all the time. And lights, all the lights! Yes, and Jacob also tests air coolers, PC fans, and cases for PC Gamer—cooling is in his blood. You could say he's cold-blooded, though you probably shouldn't.
August 14, 2026: Added the Noctua NL-LC1 as the best high-end liquid cooler.
July 23, 2025: Changed our pick for the best liquid cooler. This accolade now goes to the Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro.
June 11, 2025: Changed our pick for the best budget liquid cooler to be the Cooler Master MasterLiquid Core II.
The best liquid cooler
✅ You need serious cooling: The chunky radiator and fast fans deliver outstanding cooling performance.
✅ You want to keep your motherboard cool too: The fan in the CPU block might look like a gimmick, but it moves a decent amount of over important components on your motherboard, namely the VRM.
❌ You want the quietest cooler: The P12 Pro fans are incredibly loud, though that's partially down to running at high RPM. Drop them down and they're more bearable.
There's really no beating the Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro as the best liquid cooler. It's one of the best performers in our testing and one of the cheapest. How's that for value for money?
The Liquid Freezer Pro III in a 360 mm size, as we tested, comes with three P12 Pro fans. These run at up to 3000 rpm, which makes them extremely loud, but they operate at a much more tolerable level if you set them to a more chilled curve in your BIOS. I'd highly recommend that you do.
They're very competent fans, and along with the thick radiator and top-notch pump with VRM fan, the performance on offer here is superb. It competes with the very best, and most expensive, AIO coolers we've tested, even the expensive NL-LC1-36.
It's easy to install on AMD systems. Intel systems, less so, but for good reason. This cooler comes with a contact frame, which prevents your chip from bending inside the Independent Loading Mechanism (ILM) on your motherboard. That's a bit of an issue on older 13/14th Gen Intel chips, but it's nice to have a contact frame even on newer chips for peace of mind.
The tubes are extra long on the Liquid Freezer III Pro, which helps with unconventional case layouts. Plus there's a fan above the pump unit to keep your VRMs cool.
Altogether, the Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro is one seriously impressive unit. It's the cooler I'd choose to stick on my own CPU today, and it's good for any gaming chip. All for a very attractive price.
Read our full Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro review.
The best high-end liquid cooler
✅ You want the best performance: The NL-LC1-36 is top of the charts, and while we don't test many 420 mm coolers, the NL-LC1-42 is in a league of its own.
✅ You want a quiet PC: This is by far the quiestest liquid cooler we've tested, with an acoustic pump cover and excellent fans minimising any noise whatsoever.
❌ You need to save some cash: This is an expensive cooler, no doubt about it, and while I can't deny its brilliane, you can get similar performance (not noise levels) for less.
There's no doubt in my mind after testing this thing, the Noctua NL-LC1 is the best high-end liquid cooler. It's top of the charts for performance and bottom of the charts for noise levels—a match made in heaven.
The NL-LC1-36 is built on a liquid cooler platform called Emma V2, made by Asetek. Emma V2 is designed for performance first and foremost. It features a fast and furious pump with high flow rates to get the hot liquid away from a processor as promptly as possible. But this is where Noctua steps in. The cooling company itself specialises in quiet operation and has made a number of tweaks to Asetek's formula to get its first liquid cooler running as quiet as a mouse.
Noctua minimises noise from the NL-LC1-36 with a few clever additions. The first being three NF-A12x25 G2 fans, which perform at excellent levels in our testing with high airflow at low noise. The second being the pump cover, called the NL-PNA1. It uses 3-layer soundproofing and a floating silicone mount atop of the pump to reduce noise and vibrations. Works a treat, too.
The NL-LC1-36 is the quietest liquid cooler I've tested, at just 41.5 dB(A) on my noise level meter from 40 cm away. For comparison, the Liquid Freezer III Pro reaches 52 dB(A).
I've tested seven liquid coolers alongside the NL-LC1-36. It stands out from the rest. When faced with the daunting prospect of cooling an Intel Core i7 14700K running at 1.325 V during the torturous Prime95 benchmark, it shrugs it off. The chip sits at just 66°C on average during that test. Lower than other 360 mm coolers, including the excellent Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro, if only by a single degree.
There's one cooler that beat the NL-LC1-36. That's the NL-LC1-42. Same cooler, bigger fans, bigger radiator—it's a given that it would win out overall. Though the NL-LC1-36 is still the quieter of the two, by one whole decibel. It's also cheaper, though both coolers do come with a large price tag compared to the competition.
Read our full Noctua NL-LC1-36 review.
The best liquid cooler with a screen
✅ You want a screen inside your PC case: The NZXT has an exceptionally good-looking screen stuck on it. It's actually a 60 Hz, 640 x 640 IPS, which is maybe even overkill for this use case.
❌ You want a screen but you don't mind the details: The newer NZXT Kraken Plus 360 RGB comes with a worse screen and thicker cables but it's 80% of the way to this sort of aesthetic. It's also a lot cheaper than the Kraken Elite.
It might not be for everyone, but stick a screen on your liquid cooler's pump and it can really bring a build together. Or just show your weirdest GIFs. Either way, the NZXT Kraken Elite RGB is the best liquid cooler we've tested with a screen.
Attached to the top of NZXT's pump sits a 2.72-inch IPS screen rated to 60 Hz. It's controlled by NZXT's CAM software, which isn't my favorite, but it's hard to avoid some sort of software with a screen on your CPU. CAM gets the job done, at least. Through the app, you can program this screen to show key stats about your system, gifs, images... just don't do anything weird.
Surrounding the screen is a diffused LED ARGB ring, which really adds to the whole visual effect offered by the Kraken Elite. Two slim tubes shoot off from the pump unit, which are fairly slim and easy to move, and they're exceedingly long at 460 mm.
The tubing hides another great feature of the Kraken Elite. It contains the cables required to control the screen and power the pump. Those are placed within a controller module on the radiator, not unlike the Hyte Thicc Q60, and mean you end up with a cable-free finish that looks superb and might trick a few of your friends into thinking you're a cable management genius. It's smart, and you want that sort of attention to detail on a liquid cooler this pricey.
This is a hella expensive liquid cooler. Practically CPU money, and it's only meant to cool the darn thing. But if you're prepared to go over the top on your next PC build, the Kraken Elite is a great way to do it.
Read our full NZXT Kraken Elite 360 RGB review.
How we test liquid coolers
We put all of the liquid coolers we review through a benchmarking suite designed to inform us about the limitations of any given cooler. We take the average and maximum CPU temperature across various stress tests using an Intel Core i7 14700K, with a Maximum Turbo Power of 253 W, which we run for extended periods.
We run the Core i7 14700K at two fixed voltages: 1.275 V and 1.325 V. The higher the voltage, and the more intensive the workload, the more heat this chip generates.
We take the average and maximum CPU temperature across various stress tests, which we run for extended periods and using different settings. The tests are:
- Baldur's Gate 3 - A 5-minute gameplay test
- x264 encoding - A spiky test that bounces between 90 W and 165 W
- Prime95 - An intensive test that hammers many of the CPU cores at once
Check out the results below:
Temperature benchmarks w/ liquid coolers
Evaluating cooler effectiveness with a Core i7 14700K
| Product | Value |
|---|---|
| Asus Prime LC 240 ARGB | 52 Max °C, 50 Avg °C |
| Cooler Master MasterLiquid Core II | 53 Max °C, 49 Avg °C |
| Corsair Nautilus 360 RS | 50 Max °C, 48 Avg °C |
| MSI CoreLiquid P13 360 | 49 Max °C, 48 Avg °C |
| Noctua NL-LC1-36 | 48 Max °C, 46 Avg °C |
| Noctua NL-LC1-42 | 46 Max °C, 45 Avg °C |
We also record the noise produced by the fan(s) and pump at 100% speed. Here are the results:
Noise levels - liquid coolers
Fan noise for various liquid coolers, as measured from 40 cm away
Fan noise | 40 cm away
| Product | Value |
|---|---|
| Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro 360 A-RGB | 52 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 36 Noise floor (dBA) |
| Asus Prime LC 240 ARGB | 48 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 34 Noise floor (dBA) |
| Cooler Master MasterLiquid Core II | 47.5 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 34 Noise floor (dBA) |
| Corsair Nautilus 360 RS | 49 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 35 Noise floor (dBA) |
| MSI CoreLiquid P13 360 | 46 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 34 Noise floor (dBA) |
| Noctua NL-LC1-36 | 41.5 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 36.5 Noise floor (dBA) |
| Noctua NL-LC1-42 | 42.5 Fans @ 100% (dBA), 36.5 Noise floor (dBA) |
Frequently asked questions
Is a liquid cooler better than an air cooler?
Good quality all-in-one liquid coolers generally outperform air coolers, but air cooling is generally cheaper. There are exceptions to this but that's the state of play most of the time. Liquid can act as a better thermal conductor than air, which means it's better at transferring heat away from your CPU.
If you're worrying about leaking with a liquid cooler, I wouldn't I've tested liquid coolers for nearly 10 years and I'm yet to see a single leak. And I have not always treated them as carefully as one should. Liquid coolers are surprisingly robust these days.
Noise levels are highly dependent on the fans used, but providing the pump on a liquid cooler is pretty quiet, which most are these days, they can run without making much of a nuiscence. That said, air coolers do tend to run, on average, quieter in our testing.
A good air cooler should also last longer than a good AIO cooler, though both should last a very long time. The pump is an extra point of failure on a liquid cooler, but I've still got some running 10+ years later. Both options may see a fan fail during their lifetime, so making sure you can replace that is a good shout.
Is an AIO cooler worth it?
If you really want to go all out, you’re maybe better off with a fully custom water-cooling loop, but they are complicated, expensive, require maintenance, and have far more points of failure. AIOs are simple, they’re all but maintenance-free, they're cheaper, and they cool exceptionally well—the 360 mm and bigger ones do, at least.
If you want simplicity and low costs, look to the best air coolers, though they don't fare as well with the hottest CPUs you can buy today.
Do you need to refill AIO coolers?
Coolers can 'degrade' over time as coolant slowly evaporates. Some coolers, such as the Be Quiet! Light Loop, offer ways to refill the liquid contained inside for better efficiency later in life. That said, this isn't something you need to worry about too much, as we still run coolers on team that are getting up to a decade old without issue. These kinds of things are becoming less of a concern as manufacturers learn new tricks and methods after years of testing and feedback.
The reliability of AIO coolers has come a long way, too. AIO leaks are exceedingly rare. Like any other mechanical device, there’s always the low possibility of a pump failure, but luckily, modern CPUs have protection built in should it get too hot.
The bottom line is that you can run an AIO in your system with peace of mind.
Can you use an all-in-one liquid cooler on any CPU?
For the most part, for desktop chips, yes. Though there are some things to be aware of.
Most of the best AIO coolers support AMD and Intel's latest desktop CPUs—in other words, those that use the AM5 socket for the former and the LGA 1851 socket for the latter. However, older chips may have limited support.
If you plan on sticking with AMD's AM5 platform, any cooler you get now will be good for a couple of years, at the very least. Whereas on Intel's processors you usually get two chip generations per socket.
Even if your processor doesn't support the latest socket, some manufacturers will offer kits you can order that include the required brackets. Just check their website to find out if that's possible.
