- iPhone chip efficiency has improved 385x since 2007 launch, based on benchmarks
- A17 and A18 chips in iPhone 16 fashions proceed Apple’s environment friendly efficiency pattern
- Subsequent-gen iPhone may push CPU efficiency previous 500x authentic iPhone processor
A brand new investigation from PC Watch has in contrast the efficiency of Apple’s smartphone chips over time, and located the iPhone CPU has improved by 384.9x because the authentic mannequin launched in 2007.
The evaluation used Geekbench knowledge to trace efficiency throughout generations, estimating a mean annual enchancment price of round 40%.
Based mostly on that trajectory, the next-generation iPhone 17 Professional, anticipated later in 2025, may push that determine previous the 500x mark.
Extra performance-focused
The unique iPhone, which Steve Jobs launched again in 2007, was powered by a ARM11-based SoC from Samsung. That chip had a rated frequency of 620MHz but it surely really ran at simply 412MHz.
For the iPhone 3GS, launched two years later, Apple went for a Cortex-A8 core Samsung CPU (APL0298C05) marking the beginnings of extra performance-focused chip design.
In 2013, Apple launched the iPhone 5s, which was the primary smartphone to ship with a 64-bit processor, the Apple A7 (Cyclone). The transfer nudged Apple forward of the remainder of the cell business on the time.
Apple’s design philosophy has lengthy targeted on balancing energy with effectivity. Whereas Android chipmakers embraced eight- and ten-core designs, Apple has caught with six-core layouts since 2017, usually that includes two high-performance cores and 4 effectivity cores.
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Regardless of that, Apple persistently ranks at or close to the highest in each single-threaded and multi-core efficiency.
2024’s iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Professional continued that method. The usual fashions use the A17 Bionic chip, constructed on a 3nm course of, and scored over 8100 on PC Watch's Geekbench 6 testing. The Professional fashions use the A18 Bionic, which achieved scores above 8500 and have core clocks exceeding 4GHz.
For comparability, the iPhone 13 Professional Max from 2021 scored about 5700 in the identical benchmark. That interprets to a 50% enchancment over three years.
The efficiency will increase achieved by the varied generations of iPhone from 2007 onwards is clearly enormous, however there are caveats to the methodology used for testing. It’s necessary to notice that the numbers embrace estimated conversions for the older iPhones which predate trendy benchmarks.
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