TSMC in mass production of 10nm 'A11' chips for Apple's 'iPhone 8'

TSMC is reportedly churning out 10-nanometer "A11" processors for Apple's "iPhone 8," which is likely to be announced early next month — even if a ship date is still nebulous.

TSMC is applying the same 10-nanometer FinFET manufacturing technique being used to make A10X chips for this year's 10.5- and 12.9-inch iPad Pros, DigiTimes said on Monday. The A10X is in fact believed to be the first chip produced with the technique, though TSMC does have other clients.

By contrast, the A10 used in the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus sports a 16-nanometer design. Shrinking allows for better performance in a similarly-sized package, including more power effienciency.

The "iPhone 8" could ship as soon as next month — but if so, possibly in very low quantities. Indeed it's rumored that the phone will only start mass assembly in September, when typically Apple prefers to have a month or two under its belt for any new iPhone.

The company may be counting on the "iPhone 7s" and "7s Plus," which should share some "8" features — like the "A11" and wireless charging — but use 4.7- and 5.5-inch LCDs instead of an edge-to-edge, 5.8-inch OLED panel. They should also have physical home buttons with Touch ID, whereas the "8" will have a virtual button and may even abandon Touch ID in favor of facial recognition.

30 Comments

Metriacanthosaurus 8 Years · 880 comments

About 7 years ago

I'm guessing the 7s, 7s Plus, and 8 will all share the same A11 chip. There isn't really any reason to think otherwise.

It is amazing to think that the 7s/7s Plus will be typical "S" model phones that could have stood alone as worthy upgrades...and in the shadow of the 8 they will essentially just be the "good enough" model for users looking at price over everything else.

Wooloomooloo 8 Years · 26 comments

Why is Apple trying to release the 7s and 8 in the same year?

robjn 8 Years · 283 comments

Another "iPhone 8" headline with a story that actually applies to all the upcoming iPhones.

tmay 11 Years · 6456 comments

Wooloomooloo said:

Why is Apple trying to release the 7s and 8 in the same year?

The iPhone 8 is the lead in a new class of "super premium iPhones" that is able to provide an enhanced features set less burdened by constraints of the supply chain at typical iPhone volumes of near 200 million units a year. Expect these to be built in much smaller volumes, constrained in this specify case by the limited availability of OLED displays.

stantheman 11 Years · 332 comments

Wooloomooloo said:

Why is Apple trying to release the 7s and 8 in the same year?

The iPhone "Pro" seems to be a new premium product line, priced above the existing iPhone X/XS line. The same happened with iPad ---> iPad Pro as well as iMac and iPod. Why? Because marginal revenue exceeds marginal cost for the new product line (after accounting for "cannibalization"). Apple may charge $300 more for the Pro, but only spend only $150 more to design and produce it, compared to iPhone 7S.