Apple is equipping its new iPhones with brand new chips: the regular iPhone 16 gets the A18, the Plus gets a Pro.

Apple is equipping its entire new iPhone generation with new processors and, for once, is refraining from recycling chips from the previous year. The phone manufacturer is introducing the A18 chip and the A18 Pro, which contain some minor improvements compared to the basic model. The chips follow the A17.

Both ARM-based chips contain a six-core CPU section: two high-performance cores and four efficient cores. The A18 and A18 Pro have the same number of cores, but the A18 Pro is said to have more cache on board for subtle performance improvements.

GPU and NPU

In addition, both chips have a GPU hatch. The A18 has five GPU cores, the A18 Pro has six. In both cases, the integrated graphics component supports ray tracing.

Then there’s the NPU. It will have 16 cores and offer improved memory bandwidth compared to the previous generation. This isn’t very exciting for us, as most of the AI-related features Apple is proposing for the iPhone won’t be coming to the EU right away.

The A18 Pro further differs from the regular A18 by incorporating stronger hardware acceleration for things like media encoding. For example, ProRes video is built into the A18 Pro, but not the A18.

Small difference

For the everyday user, there is not much difference: the A18 and A18 Pro are very similar chips. Apple is probably making the decision to use a new chip for this entire generation mainly out of self-interest. Every new iPhone has the same NPU capabilities, which is important in the home market. After all, the AI ​​features in iOS are available there.