A20 Pro: the truth about Apple’s 15% faster, 30% more efficient chip

Apple is expected to put a processor called the A20 Pro inside the iPhone 18 Pro, the iPhone 18 Pro Max and its first foldable phone in September. It would be the first iPhone chip built on a 2-nanometre manufacturing process. And there are some numbers already circulating: 15% faster, and 30% more efficient.

Where the two numbers come from

Of course, as of now, before the new iPhones are unveiled, neither number is from Apple.

Both trace back to Jeff Pu, an analyst at Hong Kong investment bank Haitong, who wrote in June 2025 that the A20 Pro would use TSMC’s N2 process, and repeated it in January 2026. Pu was reading TSMC’s published specification for the node.

TSMC is the Taiwanese company that manufactures Apple’s processors. It says its N2 process delivers a 10% to 15% speed increase at the same power draw, or a 25% to 30% reduction in power draw at the same speed, compared with the N3E process it replaces. Chip density rises by about 15%.

The important word here is the “or”. A chip designer must choose. Spend the improvement on speed and you get up to 15% more of it while power stays flat. Spend it on battery and you get up to 30% less power draw while speed stays flat. Split the difference and you get some of each, and less of both.

Apple would not be first to 2nm

Samsung already jumped on the 2nm process in December of 2025 with the Exynos 2600. That chip is built on Samsung Foundry’s own 2nm process and has been shipping in some Galaxy S26 models since March. The A20 Pro would be the first iPhone chip on 2nm, and the first phone chip on TSMC’s 2nm.

Earlier in our coverage of the then upcoming Pixel 11, we said Google’s Tensor G6 would be built on TSMC’s 2nm process. That turned out to be wrong. Google’s VP of Hardware Peng Yu-chun told Taiwan’s CNA news agency that the G6 uses an improved 3nm process instead.

What actually changed in the package

Leaked motherboard images shared on Weibo in June by the accounts WHYLAB and Ice Universe, reported by MacRumors, show the A20 Pro using Wafer-Level Multi-Chip Module packaging. Apple has always stacked the memory directly on top of the processor. WMCM moves it to the side.

Stacking is compact and fast, but it traps heat between two components that both produce it. Moving the memory sideways separates those heat sources, so the phone can run hard for longer before it slows itself down to cool off. The same images show a noticeably larger Neural Processing Unit, the section that runs on-device AI, on a die roughly the same size as the A19 Pro’s. We reported the same packaging change in July from the alleged 630GB Tata Electronics document leak, which also showed a bigger vapour chamber for cooling.

What happened the last time these numbers circulated

The A19 Pro in the current iPhone 17 Pro was rumoured before launch at almost identical figures: up to 15% faster, up to 30% more efficient.

Notebookcheck’s testing put the shipped A19 Pro at roughly 15% faster than the A18 Pro in single-core and 20% in multi-core. So the speed figure held. But Apple’s own headline claim at the iPhone 17 launch was up to 40% better sustained performance, and that came from the new vapour chamber rather than the chip. Early AnTuTu runs cited by research firm Futurum in September 2025 showed the A19 Pro only about 4% ahead of the A18 Pro overall.

The part that reaches you

2nm is the most expensive silicon TSMC has ever sold. Supply chain reporting puts N2 wafers at roughly $30,000 each, against $18,000 to $20,000 for 3nm. Research firm TrendForce has pushed back on the steeper readings. It puts the real increase closer to 10% to 20% once customer contracts are accounted for. TSMC does not publish wafer prices, so every figure here comes from supply chain sources rather than a price list.

Pu, the same analyst behind the 15% figure, told clients on 31 July that iPhone 18 Pro models could cost $250 to $300 more than the current Pro models, which start at $1,099 and $1,199. He cut his rating on Apple stock from buy to hold in the same note.

That matters here because Kenyan shops price around replacement cost. As we found on 2 August, iStreet Kenya has listed the 256GB iPhone 17 Pro at KES 165,000 and the Pro Max at KES 180,000 since December, unchanged for seven months. A higher dollar price in September feeds through to Nairobi shelves fairly quickly. Apple has already raised prices this year on Macs, iPads, the Apple TV and the Vision Pro, and is rumoured to be considering iPhone increases too.

What to understand

From all the noise, remember that the A20 Pro is a real chip built on the new manufacturing process. However, the promises of more speed, or better battery efficiency can only be confirmed when the phones arrive on people’s hands.