The next Apple silicon chip — the M5 — has reportedly already begun mass production and will soon be making its debut in the upcoming iPad Pro. While the M5 will obviously be more powerful than its predecessor it won’t be making the next gen leap everyone was expecting it to.
Apple’s M5 chip is apparently still going to be made using TSMC’s (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) 3 nm process. The M3 and M4 chips were also manufactured at 3 nm albeit using less advanced processes. M5 chips will continue that trend in lieu of being made using TSMC’s 2 nm manufacturing process.
This decision was probably made to keep overall costs down especially now with the threat of President Trump’s tariffs. The M5 chips will also use a newer assembly process that will allow more circuit layers to be stacked on top of each other. This will make for better efficiency despite the decision to stick with 3 nm chipset designs.
However, also worth keeping in mind is that modern chip measurements aren’t exactly accurate. A long time ago chip measurements in nanometers stopped being about the size of elements in transistors and instead became more of a marketing term. So while Apple’s M5 chips may not be using the latest and greatest technologies they will still be a decent enough improvement over the M4 lineup.
Apple silicon was revolutionary for the company’s products. | Image credit — PhoneArena
Speaking of Apple’s chip lineup the first M5 chips entering mass production are reportedly the standard variant. The Pro, Max and Ultra variants will enter production shortly. M5 chips, especially the lower end variants, won’t be a major leap over the M4 chips. Even the M3 and M2 chips barely show their age after so many years.
Apple silicon was revolutionary for the company’s products. It completely transformed how efficient Apple’s devices were and made them formidable rivals to products from other major companies.
Since the M1 chip we’ve been seeing incremental upgrades and I doubt that will change with the M5. However it’s still going to be a step forward and any upcoming Apple devices using the M5 chips will be a worthy purchase in my opinion.
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Abdullah loves smartphones, Virtual Reality, and audio gear. Though he covers a wide range of news his favorite is always when he gets to talk about the newest VR venture or when Apple sets the industry ablaze with another phenomenal release.
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