The Intel Core i5-6500 is a desktop processor featuring 4 cores, which was introduced in July 2015. It belongs to the Core i5 series and is based on the Skylake architecture, utilizing Socket 1151. The Core i5-6500 is equipped with 6 MB of L3 cache and operates at a base frequency of 3.2 GHz, with the potential to boost up to 3.6 GHz, contingent upon the workload. Manufactured using a 14 nm process, the specific transistor count for the Core i5-6500 remains unspecified. Additionally, the processor has a locked multiplier, which restricts its overclocking potential.

The Core i5-6500 operates with a thermal design power (TDP) of 65 W, which aligns with the standard power consumption for contemporary personal computers. This Intel processor is compatible with DDR4 memory utilizing a dual-channel configuration. The maximum officially recognized memory speed is 2133 MT/s; however, it is possible to achieve greater speeds through overclocking, provided that suitable memory modules are employed. For interfacing with other components within the system, the Core i5-6500 utilizes a PCI-Express Gen 3 connection. Additionally, this processor is equipped with the HD Graphics 530 integrated graphics solution.

The Core i5-6500 features hardware virtualization, significantly enhancing the performance of virtual machines. Furthermore, it supports IOMMU virtualization (PCI passthrough), allowing guest virtual machines to directly access host hardware. Applications that utilize Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX) will benefit from improved performance on this processor, particularly for computation-intensive tasks. In addition to AVX, Intel has also incorporated the more recent AVX2 standard; however, AVX-512 is not supported.