Intel Sets Date For Core Ultra Series 2 Lunar Lake Mobile CPU Lineup Launch

Intel Core Ultra Series 2 Lunar Lake render (angled) on a blue background.
It's been a couple of months since Intel introduced its upcoming Lunar Lake chip architecture at Computex in Taiwan, and at the time the chip maker said the first round of chips based on Lunar Lake would arrive sometime in the third quarter. As we approach the midway point of Q3, Intel is putting the word out that Lunar Lake will formally launch on September 3, 2024, just ahead of the IFA 2024 event that begins on September 6.

We've already posted a deep dive on Lunar Lake, and if you haven't done so already, we encourage you to give it a read. The short of it, however, is that Lunar Lake is Intel's mobile moonshot in what has become an even more competitive landscape with the arrival of more Arm-based solutions challenging x86's dominance, namely with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite and Plus platforms powering the first wave of Copilot+ laptops.

If we go back even further, it's notable that Apple opted to move on from Intel's x86 silicon and switch to in-house designs based on Arm to power its entire Mac lineup. The onus is on both Intel and AMD to deliver competitive power-efficient x86 solutions to stave off an even bigger industry shift than what has already occurred.

Intel slide on Lunar Lake.

In that regard, Lunar Lake is a return salvo of sorts. Lunar Lake will make its chip debut in the form of the Core Ultra Series 2 lineup, which are ultra-low power mobile processors for laptops. According to Intel, the upcoming chips will deliver "unprecedented x86 power efficiency for thin and light laptops," along with "unmatched AI compute" delivering up to 120 platform TOPS.

Lunar Lake is an important launch, and while Meteor Lake was mainly focused on the transition to a tiled architecture, Lunar Lake is a much bigger overhaul with a lot going for it—on-package LPDDR5X memory, tightly-optimized Lion Cove P-cores, radically-revised Skymont E-cores, major improvements to thread scheduling, and more.

"Ahead of the IFA 2024 conference, join Michelle Johnston Holthaus, Intel executive vice president and general manager of the Client Computing Group, and Jim Johnson, senior vice president and general manager of the Client Business Group, and Intel partners as they launch the next generation of Intel Core Ultra processors, code-named Lunar Lake. During the livestreamed event, they will reveal details on the new processors’ breakthrough x86 power efficiency, exceptional core performance, massive leaps in graphics performance and the unmatched AI computing power that will drive this and future generations of Intel products," Intel said in its launch event announcement.

Intel plans on livestreaming the September 3 Lunar Lake launch event beginning at 9:00am PDT (12:00pm EDT).