Apple decided to change things a bit, giving a new chipset for all its new iPhones, rather than sticking to the previous generation for less expensive options. Both new SoCs are based on the same design with 2nd generation 3nm manufacturing process, and featuring a 6-core CPU design with two performance and four efficient cores. As for the GPU, Apple is advertising "desktop-class architecture" with mesh shading and significant performance uplift. The big part of new chipsets is the whole new NPU, a 16-core one that is capable of 35 TOPS and has access to 17 percent more memory bandwidth, making it 2x faster and more efficient compared to the predecessor.

The A18 Pro, gets the 6-core CPU with next-generation ML accelerators, has larger cache compared to the A18, and, according to Apple, is 15 percent faster and 20 percent more power-efficient compared to the A17 Pro. It also comes with a 6-core GPU, which leads to a 20 percent higher performance. In addition to the new NPU, which is the same on both the A18 Pro and the A18, the A18 Pro gets special "advanced media" features, including ProMotion and Always-on display support, ProRes video recording, and USB 3 support, which will not be available on the A18 SoC.

The vanilla A18 SoC, stick with the same CPU, but with less cache, and cuts-down to a 5-core GPU. While it comes with the same NPU, it will lack these "advanced media" features. Nevertheless, this is enough for 40 percent higher GPU performance, according to Apple, at least compared to the A16 Bionic SoC.

As it is usually the case, Apple was not keen in revealing clock speeds, cache size, memory, or any other CPU and GPU details, at least not yet, but hopefully, we'll hear more about them soon.