Apple is already designing 2nm chips to power future iPhones،
Amid the ongoing chip race, Apple may be moving faster as it is reportedly designing chips that will take advantage of Taiwan-based TSMC's 2nm manufacturing process to power future iPhone and Mac devices.
A post that went viral on LinkedIn and was later picked up by a Korean site (gamma0burst) and Revegnus (on Twitter), indicates that an Apple employee is working on the project which speaks of “TS5nm, TS3mnm and TS2nm”. Although the alleged slide is heavily worded, one can easily make sense of the aforementioned string. Here, 5nm, 3nm, and 2nm represent the manufacturing process that Apple has been working on previously, currently, and in the future, respectively.
Apple and TSMC work closely to make fabulous 2nm chips
From the leaked slide, one could say that Apple is already working on a 2nm chipset which is expected to arrive in 2025. With a lower node size, the size of the transistors reduces significantly, ultimately allowing more to be integrated . This results in higher performance and better energy efficiency.
For example, Apple uses a 5nm chipset on the iPhone 14 Pro series. In the latest iPhone 15 Pro series, it switched to 3nm chips from TSMC. Thanks to the new improved manufacturing process, the chips were 10% faster in terms of CPU speed, 20% faster in terms of GPU speed, and 2x faster in terms of neural engine. Similar improvements have been seen on Apple's M3 series of chipsets designed for Mac devices.
Keeping the latest information in mind, Apple could make appropriate changes to the chip designs to get the most out of TSMC's 2nm process.
TSMC manufacturing schedule is in sync with Apple
According to the timeline, TSMC – Apple's main chip maker and supplier, is eyeing 2nm chips by 2025 which are expected to power the upcoming iPhone 17 series. That being said, TSMC will move to 1.4 nm chips nm with the initial launch in 2027 before moving to insane 1nm technologies in the following years. For reference, a strand of human hair is 80,000 to 100,000 mm wide, which shows how tiny the transistors in these chips are.
Without a doubt, Apple is a major (and high-profile) customer for TSMC. So much so that Apple reserved all 3nm chips for Apple last year. With this in mind, we hope that TSMC will provide Apple with the initially manufactured chips (based on the 1.4nm process) to power the future lineup of iPhones, iPads, and Macs.
TSMC will switch from FinFET transistors to GAA-based transistors, which will reduce current leakage potential and increase drive current. This will potentially help upcoming chipsets work properly. The Taiwanese chipmaker recently sampled its 2nm chips from Apple and Nvidia and it appears the former will grab them first. This is not to say that there are no other players in the game. Samsung is also actively working on its 2nm technology which you can read about here.
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