A16 Bionic meant for iPhone 14 may employ TSMC's 4nm tech
Smartphone chips manufactured using the 5nm tech were a considerable improvement over 7nm SoCs and it could be a while before we see a performance jump of similar magnitude. The A16 Bionic, which is presumed to be the name of Apple's next mobile chipset, will reportedly not be based on the next process node, and will instead use an even more advanced variant of the 5nm tech.
TSMC is struggling with the 3nm tech, so Apple will have to settle for 4nm
A smaller nm means that a chip can have smaller transistors, allowing manufacturers to pack more of them onto a single chip. This helps the chip run at a faster speed and a lower power.
At first, it was being reported that next year's iPhone, which will seemingly be known as the iPhone 14, will be equipped with a 3nm chip but the headline of a report that DigiTimes (via MacRumors) will publish tomorrow says that the A16 Bionic will be made using Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC)'s N4 fabrication technology.
2020's iPhone 12 series' A14 Bionic chip was the first commercial 5nm chip manufactured by TSMC. It was significantly faster and more energy-efficient than the 7nm A13 Bionic that fuels the iPhone 11. This year, Apple has again used TSMC's 5nm process, but it's believed to be the performance-enhanced N5P version.
The N4 or 4nm tech is yet another iteration of the 5nm technology and will likely offer modest performance and energy efficiency improvements. To be more specific, we can expect performance to be around 11 percent better than the A14 Bionic and energy efficiency to increase 22 percent, assuming the chip will be based on the newer N4P tech.
The 3nm tech, which will be a "full node stride" from the 5nm tech, will offer up to 15 percent better performance or up to 30 percent power reduction compared to the 5nm tech and the iPad Pro could be the first Apple device to feature a 3nm chip.
Samsung and Qualcomm's upcoming flagship chips will also reportedly be made using the 4nm tech.
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