A18-series chips to get a “significant” increase in Neural Engine cores for AI in iOS 18،
As Apple looks to add new generative AI features to Siri, Shortcuts, Messages, Apple Music and other features in iOS 18, the tech giant plans to upgrade the Neural Engine on the upcoming A18 and M4 chips. A report from
Daily economic news says the new chips will see a significant increase in the number of cores used in the neural engine, leading to an improvement in the chips' AI and machine learning capabilities.
We should see Apple introduce
iOS 18 at WWDC 2024 in June. The A18 series chips will debut with the
iPhone 16 series in September. The A18 Bionic will power the
iPhone16 And
iPhone16 More. The A18
Pro will drive the
iPhone16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max. Both A18 chips will be manufactured by TSMC using its second-generation 3nm (N3E) process node.
Apple expected to increase the number of cores of the Neural Engine of the A18 series chipsets
While Apple has kept the Neural Engine's core count at 16 since the A14 Bionic used with the iPhone 12 series, the speed and performance of the Neural Engine has improved over time. According to Apple, the Neural Engine of the A17 Pro chip used with the iPhone 15 Pro series is twice as fast as the Neural Engine of the A16 Bionic component of the iPhone 14 Pro series.
The amount of silicon wafers expected to be produced by TSMC for 3nm chip production for Apple this year is expected to increase by 50% from last year, making Apple the foundry's largest customer. In addition to increasing the production quantity of wafers for TSMC to turn into chips, Apple was also able to secure large production capacity for TSMC's advanced packaging production.
Apple has included a Neural Engine on its A-series chips since 2017's A11 Bionic, used on the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, and iPhone an octa-core. Neural Engine for the A12 and A13 Bionic in 2018 and 2019 respectively.
