# Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE

- Source: https://stierproducts.com/products/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se
- Category board: https://stierproducts.com/categories/cpu-coolers
- Placement: #5 of 24 in CPU Coolers, B tier
- Brand: Thermalright
- LP on this board: 639
- Last researched: 2026-09-10T07:50:31.460Z
- Method: https://stierproducts.com/methodology
- Dataset: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22062813 - every board at once, one dated snapshot per release, same licence, prices and photographs left out
- Reuse: Text, rankings, tier assignments, LP values and verdicts are free to quote and reuse with attribution to stierproducts and a link to the source URL (CC BY 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Product photographs are not covered: they belong to their respective owners and are reproduced to illustrate the product being reviewed. Do not redistribute them under this licence.

## Verdict

Tom's Hardware and PCGamesN both crown it, and its utter simplicity - a heatsink plus two cheap fans - means almost nothing can fail unfixably, which is exactly what long-term ownership rewards.

## For

- One of the best-performing air coolers Tom's Hardware has tested
- Runs whisper-silent
- Essentially unbeatable on value
- Pure passive heatsink with no pump, controller or software; a cheap fan swap fixes almost any failure
- Trades blows with coolers costing several times more

## Evidence

Consolidated from 19 cited sources across 14 outlets

| Outlet | Said by | Stance | Link | Link status |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| PCGamesN | - | B | https://www.pcgamesn.com/best-cpu-cooler | fetched and confirmed |
| PC Analytics | PC Analytics | - | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teiqQyhNc_U | fetched and confirmed |
| STS | STS | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5yplk42FwI | fetched and confirmed |
| Northern Viking Everyday | Northern Viking Everyday | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuKGIY8R4uI | fetched and confirmed |
| Loki's Channel | Loki's Channel | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fp7dMeltpKA | fetched and confirmed |
| STS | Megaman-Zero-626 | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5yplk42FwI#comments | fetched and confirmed |
| PC Analytics | nathangamble125 | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4628_2mnRs#comments | fetched and confirmed |
| PC Analytics | PC Analytics | - | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIpB8iwYZcg | fetched and confirmed |
| PC Analytics | PC Analytics | - | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g40wHgT61oo | fetched and confirmed |
| Hardware For Gamers | chairman67 | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHsBOSLOQ8U#comments | fetched and confirmed |
| Jack's Hardware | Jack's Hardware | B | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4oqxMckR1M | fetched and confirmed |
| Vivid Repairs | Vivid Repairs | S | https://www.vividrepairs.co.uk/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se-review | fetched and confirmed |
| Thirstybear | thirstybear.com | B | https://www.thirstybear.com/best-cpu-coolers/ | fetched and confirmed |
| Tom's Hardware | tomshardware.com | B | https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-cpu-coolers,4181.html | fetched and confirmed |
| PCGamesN | Edward Chester | B | https://www.pcgamesn.com/thermalright/peerless-assassin-120-se-deal | fetched and confirmed |
| MaxMyBuild | maxmybuild.com | B | https://www.maxmybuild.com/guides/choosing-parts/best-cpu-cooler-2026 | fetched and confirmed |
| Budget Loadout | Russ | B | https://budgetloadout.com/best-budget-cpu-cooler/ | fetched and confirmed |
| Windows Central | windowscentral.com | B | https://www.windowscentral.com/best-cpu-coolers | fetched and confirmed |
| EveZone | NexusNerd | B | https://evezone.evetech.co.za/performance-pulse/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se-vs-alternatives-best-cooler-at-this-price | fetched and confirmed |

## Nearest alternatives on this board

| Rank | Product | Tier | Page |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro 360 | S | https://stierproducts.com/products/arctic-liquid-freezer-iii-pro-360 |
| 2 | Noctua NH-D15 G2 | S | https://stierproducts.com/products/noctua-nh-d15-g2 |
| 3 | Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE | A | https://stierproducts.com/products/thermalright-phantom-spirit-120-se |
| 4 | Noctua NL-LC1-36 | A | https://stierproducts.com/products/noctua-nl-lc1-36 |
| 6 | Lian Li Galahad II Trinity Performance 360 | B | https://stierproducts.com/products/lian-li-galahad-ii-trinity-performance-360 |
| 7 | Thermalright Grand Vision 360 | B | https://stierproducts.com/products/thermalright-grand-vision-360 |
| 8 | Arctic Freezer 36 | B | https://stierproducts.com/products/arctic-freezer-36 |
| 9 | ID-COOLING FX360 PRO | C | https://stierproducts.com/products/id-cooling-fx360-pro |
| 10 | Thermalright AXP90-X47 | C | https://stierproducts.com/products/thermalright-axp90-x47 |
| 24 | Cooler Master Hyper 212 Black Edition | F | https://stierproducts.com/products/cooler-master-hyper-212-black |

The full board is at https://stierproducts.com/categories/cpu-coolers.

## What this tier means

- B: Good. A solid choice with real caveats worth knowing.

## How to read this

- Each category is researched in four independent runs, one per lens (expert consensus, value, reliability, community pulse). Every run ranks a board of candidates that deliberately includes products buyers cross-shop but should avoid. Placements score on a ranked ladder (LP), and tiers are derived from LP, so no tier is ever assigned by hand.
- LP is this product's points on its own category ladder. It is comparable within a category and not across categories.
- Link status reports what our pre-publication link check found when it fetched the cited URL. It says nothing about the quality of the review.
- A citation with no usable link is listed rather than dropped, and is excluded from the counted total above.

## Image

https://stspimgdevmfyk46r5vwkay.blob.core.windows.net/images/products/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se.webp

Product photographs are not covered: they belong to their respective owners and are reproduced to illustrate the product being reviewed. Do not redistribute them under this licence.