A18 Pro: What to expect from Apple’s next rumored chipset
The A18 Pro is likely to be Apple’s next-generation mobile chipset and will power the yet-to-be-announced iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max – and possibly even the cheaper iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus.
All four devices are expected to launch at Apple’s next event on September 9, and we can’t wait to see how the A18 Pro, which will undoubtedly be more powerful than the current A17 Pro chipset inside the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max, improves on Apple’s best iPhones ever.
Below, we’ve detailed the biggest leaks, rumors, and predictions surrounding Apple’s likely next chipset. We’ll update this page with more information once the iPhone 16 series – and, we hope, the A18 Pro – are announced in the coming days.
A18 Pro: expected release date
As mentioned, Apple has confirmed that its next product launch event will take place on Monday, September 9 at 10:00 am PT / 1:00 pm ET / 6:00 pm BST. For residents of Australia, this will be Tuesday, September 10 at 3:00 am AEST.
We expect the company to debut the iPhone 16 line at this event, and with it the A18 Pro chipset. An iPhone 16 release date has obviously not been confirmed yet, but we predict iPhone 16 preorders will begin on Friday, September 13.
Incidentally, the colorful invite for Apple’s upcoming event features the text “It’s Glowtime,” which appears to be a reference to the Apple Intelligence toolset that will play a key role in the company’s latest products and operating systems.
In addition to the iPhone 16 and A18 Pro, Apple could also announce the AirPods 4, Apple Watch 10, and updates to iOS 18, iPadOS 18, watchOS 11, macOS Sequoia, and tvOS 18 during Monday’s event. To watch for yourself, check out our explainer on how to watch the iPhone 16 launch live.
A18 Pro: Leaks and Rumors
Apple Intelligence was announced at WWDC 2024 in June, so we already know what Apple Intelligence features we can expect to see on September 9. Tools like the new and improved Siri, Clean Up editing functionality, and automatic text summarization all require a fair amount of power to function, and that means Apple’s new devices will need a powerful chipset to take advantage of this new technology.
So the A18 Pro is going to be blazing fast, right? Maybe. In previous years, it’s been a near certainty that the flagship iPhone would have a more powerful chipset than the equivalent Android phone, but we don’t know for sure if that’ll be the case this year. According to tipster Nguyen Phi Hung on X (via Telephone Arena), the A18 Pro might only offer a 10% speed increase over the current A17 Pro, which sounds like a surprisingly small increase considering how heavily Apple Intelligence will undoubtedly play in the new iPhone lineup. That said, this is still just a rumor after all.
Also keep in mind that the A17 Pro chipset isn’t bad. Apple has already confirmed that the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max will be able to run Apple Intelligence features (or at least some of them), so the A18 Pro may not need to be that much more powerful. The A17 Pro, specifically, is a 3-nanometer chipset with a 16-core Neural Engine and a 6-core GPU that supports ray tracing, which should improve performance for mobile games like Resident Evil Village, Resident Evil 4And Dead Stranding.
The iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus, on the other hand, feature the A16 Bionic chip with just 6GB of storage, meaning they’re definitely not powerful enough to run Apple Intelligence features. The good news: rumors suggest the entire iPhone 16 lineup, including the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus, could get the A18 Pro chipset.
We’ve also heard that the A18 Pro could have a lot more cores in its Neural Engine. Spotted on Taiwanese site Economic daily news (via 9to5Mac), the Neural Engine in Apple’s next-generation chipset will have “significantly” more cores than the Neural Engine in the A17 Pro. This is promising news, since the Neural Engine is the part of Apple’s chipsets that specifically powers artificial intelligence. It makes sense, then, that the A18 Pro chipset would see a bump in Neural Engine cores to power those aforementioned power-hungry Apple Intelligence features.
As for the fact that the A18 Pro is designed with AI in mind, we’ve also heard from leaker Jeff Pu at Haiton International Tech Research (via 9to5Mac) that the A18 Pro “will have a larger die area (compared to the A17 Pro), which could herald a trend for edge AI computing.”
What is edge AI? It refers to the ability to run AI tasks on the phone itself instead of in the cloud. Edge AI is important because it can be faster and it works without an internet connection. But there are downsides. Increasing a chipset’s die area to achieve those improved speeds can reduce its ability to dissipate heat. It can also reduce power efficiency.
So with the A18 Pro, Apple will have to maximize speed and power without sacrificing heat dissipation and power efficiency. Either way, we’ll likely learn all about it at the company’s “It’s Glowtime” event, which is just around the corner.
