The Apple A18 and Apple A18 Pro are a pair of 64-bit ARM-based system on a chip (SoC) designed by Apple Inc., part of the Apple silicon series. They are used in the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro lineups, and built on a second generation 3 nm process by TSMC. Announced on September 9, 2024, they are the successors to the Apple A16 Bionic and the Apple A17 Pro processors, respectively.[5]
| General information | |
|---|---|
| Launched | September 9, 2024 |
| Designed by | Apple Inc. |
| Common manufacturer | |
| Max. CPU clock rate | to 4.04[1] GHz |
| Cache | |
| L2 cache | A18: 8 MB (performance cores) A18 Pro: 16 MB (performance cores) 4 MB (efficiency cores) |
| Last level cache | A18: 12 MB (system level cache) A18 Pro: 24 MB (system level cache) |
| Architecture and classification | |
| Application | Mobile A18
A18 Pro
|
| Technology node | 3 nm (TSMC N3E) |
| Instruction set | ARMv9.2-A[2] |
| Physical specifications | |
| Cores |
|
| Memory (RAM) | |
| GPUs | A18: 5-core A18 Pro: 6-core |
| Co-processor | NPU: 35 TOPS |
| Products, models, variants | |
| Variant | |
| History | |
| Predecessors | Apple A17 Pro (iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max) Apple A16 Bionic (iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus) |
Design
editThe Apple A18 and A18 Pro feature an Apple-designed 64-bit ARMv9.2-A six-core CPU with two high-performance cores and four energy-efficient cores, a five-core (A18) and six-core (A18 Pro) GPU and a NPU with 16 cores.
CPU
editApple claims the new A18 chip is up to 30% faster in CPU performance compared to iPhone 15 with the A16 Bionic chip and 50% compared to the iPhone 14 with the A15 Bionic chip. Also, it can deliver the same CPU performance of the A16 Bionic chip while consuming 30% less power.[6][7]
The A18 Pro is up to 15% faster in CPU performance than the A17 Pro chip, and it can deliver the same CPU performance of A17 Pro chip while consuming 20% less power. Apple claims the A18 Pro chip has larger caches than the non-Pro A18 chip.[7]
GPU
editThe A18 chip integrates a new Apple-designed five-core GPU, now adding hardware accelerated ray tracing and mesh shading support to the non-Pro lineup. Apple claims the new A18 chip is up to 40% faster in GPU performance compared to iPhone 15 with the A16 Bionic chip, and it can deliver the same GPU performance of the A16 Bionic chip while consuming 35% less power.[7]
The A18 Pro has one more GPU core, making it a six-core GPU, and it can deliver 20% faster performance compared to the GPU on the A17 Pro chip. Apple says it has 2x faster hardware ray tracing, although it’s not clear if it’s an exclusive feature of the A18 Pro chip compared to the non-Pro variant.[7]
Additional aspects
editThe A18 Pro also differentiates itself from the non-Pro variant by its advanced media features, including new display engines, faster USB controllers and new video and image signal processors. Apple claims that the new video encoder processes 2 times more data than the A17 Pro chip.[7] The A18 has a legacy USB 2.0 controller capable of only 480 Mbit/s through the USB-C port. The A18 Pro has a USB 3.2 Gen 2 controller capable of 10 Gb/s.
NPU and AI processing
editApple claims that the new 16-core Neural Engine is capable of 35 trillion operations per second, with 2x faster machine learning compared to the A16 Bionic chip. The A18 Pro, compared to the A17 Pro, can run Apple Intelligence features up to 15% faster. As shown on benchmarks, all chips in the A18 series have 8 GB of RAM, and both chips have 17% more memory bandwidth.[6][7][8]
The NPU of the A18, with 35 TOPS, is approximately 58.33 times more powerful than the NPU of the Apple A11 (600 billion operations per second versus 35 trillion operations per second), which was the first Apple chip with a Neural Engine. The A11 was introduced in 2017.[9]
Neural processing comparison between chip generations
edit| Chip | TOPS | Year of Launch | Processing power compared to the A18 |
|---|---|---|---|
| A11 Bionic | 0.6 | 2017 | 1.71% |
| A12 Bionic | 5.0 | 2018 | 14.29% |
| A13 Bionic | 6.0 | 2019 | 17.14% |
| A14 Bionic | 11.0 | 2020 | 31.43% |
| A15 Bionic | 15.8 | 2021 | 45.14% |
| A16 Bionic | 17.0 | 2022 | 48.57% |
| A17 Pro | 35.0 | 2023 | 100.00% |
| A18 | 35.0* | 2024 | 100.00%* |
*Although the A18 is theoretically capable of the same number of operations per second as the A17 Pro, real world performances may be superior due to improvements on other parts of the SoC, such as the larger memory bandwidth. Apple claims that the A18 Pro is 15% faster on Apple Intelligence tasks compared to the A17 Pro.[7]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ https://browser.geekbench.com/v6/cpu/7714134
- ^ https://www.ft.com/content/85f3efa0-c30d-4eaa-9a4d-5bd6c5243e9f
- ^ https://www.macrumors.com/2024/09/09/all-iphone-16-models-have-8gb-ram/
- ^ Petrov, Daniel (September 12, 2024). "iPhone 16 is the fastest cheap iPhone ever thanks to AI". PhoneArena. Retrieved September 14, 2024.
- ^ Hill, Brandon; Freedman, Andrew E. (September 9, 2024). "Apple's A18 and A18 Pro processors powers the iPhone 16 and 16 Pro — and Apple Intelligence". Tom's Hardware. Retrieved September 15, 2024.
- ^ a b Mayo, Benjamin (September 9, 2024). "iPhone 16 is powered by A18 chip, up to 30% faster than iPhone 15". 9to5Mac. Retrieved September 9, 2024.
- ^ a b c d e f g Apple (September 9, 2024). Apple Event - September 9. Retrieved September 14, 2024 – via YouTube.
- ^ Petrov, Daniel (September 12, 2024). "iPhone 16 is the fastest cheap iPhone ever thanks to AI". PhoneArena. Retrieved September 14, 2024.
- ^ Banerjee, Debrath. "(PDF) A Microarchitectural Study on Apple's A11 Bionic Processor". ResearchGate. Retrieved September 15, 2024.