Apple iPhone 16 To Use Armv9-A Architecture For A18 Bionic AI Superpowers

If the news out of WWDC detailing all of the things on tap for iOS 18 wasn't clear enough, Apple has gone all-in on artificial intelligence. Its rebranded Apple Intelligence has gone native, with last year's iPhone 15 Pro range and presumably the whole iPhone 16 lineup sporting on-device machine learning features. And of course, Arm also went whole hog on AI with its Armv9-A instruction set...back in 2021. Anyway, the latest version of the Arm ISA is reportedly on track to make its iPhone debut in Cupertino's latest phone chip, named A18 Bionic, on Monday. 

For those not keeping track of esoteric number and letter combinations, the Armv8-A architecture found in most smartphone chips is where Arm went 64-bit with its mobile designs. That includes just about everything from the last eight years or so from Apple and Qualcomm. Presently Apple's A17 Bionic chip from the iPhone 15 Pro family uses Armv8.6-A. The leap to Armv9-A is all about artificial intelligence, and it's what gives current Android devices an advantage processing large datasets. As far as Apple goes, Armv9-A is only found in the M4 chip which so far can only be found in the 2024 iPad Pro. 


So it only makes sense that the newest CPU design found in a relatively niche device would make its way mainstream in the iPhone lineup. After all, nearly half of Apple's revenue comes from smartphones these days. Apple said that the M4 represented a "giant leap" in performance when the company debuted the new iPad back in May. Since the debut of the M1 in late 2020, Apple's CPU core designs have been shared between Macs and iPhones (and later iPads when the M1 iPad Pro was released). A new report from the Financial Times indicates Tim Cook-ing up a plan to maintain the status quo for this year will transpire.

The coming iOS 18 has a ton of AI-related features, though not all supported iPhones will be able to utilize them. After announcing a joint venture with OpenAI, the company started beta testing Apple Intelligence in the iOS 18.1 beta (along with macOS 15.1 and iPadOS 18.1 betas) If history on Apple's x.1 updates holds true, on-device AI will probably see its full release sometime in October. The beta also features cloud integration with OpenAI, in which the phone will ask before going online to get answers to its queries. There's also some new photo touch-up tricks that use AI, which can help Apple's camera features start to catch up to what's available on Google Pixels. 


So far, the only devices supporting Apple Intelligence are iPhone 16 Pro/Pro Max, Macs with Apple Silicon, and iPads with M1 chips or later. With the debut of Armv9-A in smartphone chips, most of those are going to likely feel not quite as responsive as devices with M4 or A18 Bionic, along with new M4 Macs that are set to debut sometime later this year. Because the Apple Intelligence betas only currently run on these devices, it's not entirely clear if the cloud integration with OpenAI will be available on older devices. Our Magic 8 Ball said "don't count on it" and that tracks with what our gut is telling us. 

We expect to see Phil Schiller-ing the new iPhone lineup, along with a trio of new Apple Watches, at Apple's Glowtime event. That happens at 1PM Eastern on Monday, and can be live-streamed from Apple's website or on YouTube. You can be sure that we'll be watching, dear reader, so stay tuned for more.