[11] It was announced in November 2021 that Intel Alder Lake would use a hybrid architecture combining performance and efficiency cores, similar to ARM big.LITTLE.

[12] First laptop tests were performed later that month, with PCMag positively reviewing the Core i9-12900HK, stating the H series represented "Intel's enthusiast line," with "the same hybrid designs" also in the P-series and U-series chips to come out later that year.

Alder Lake requires special support from the operating system due to its relatively unusual-for-x86 hybrid nature.

For software unable to be upgraded, a UEFI-provided compatibility mode may be used to disable the E-cores; it is enabled by the user turning on scroll lock.

[30] The P-cores and E-cores on early versions of Alder Lake CPUs reported different CPUID models.

This has caused issues with digital rights management systems that perceive the P-cores and E-cores as being separate computers, and falsely enforce license restrictions preventing a particular piece of software from being executed on more than one device at a time.

[35] Alder Lake's CPU topology has performance implications, especially for gaming environments where the developers are not used to NUMA setups.

[40] The CPU family no longer features Intel SGX which is a requirement for playing UltraHD Blu-Ray discs.