Apple A15 Explained
Apple A15 Bionic |
Produced-Start: | September 14, 2021 |
Fastest: | 3.23 GHz[1] (2.93 GHz in iPad Mini 6)[2] |
Size-From: | 5 nm (N5P) |
Designfirm: | Apple Inc. |
Manuf1: | TSMC |
Arch: | ARMv8.6-A[3] |
Microarch: | "Avalanche" and "Blizzard" |
Code: | APL1W07[4] |
Transistors: | 15 billion |
Numcores: | 6 (4 efficiency, 2 performance) |
L2cache: | 12 MB (performance cores) 4 MB (efficient cores) |
Llcache: | 32 MB (system cache) |
Application: | Mobile |
Gpu: | Apple-designed 4- or 5- core GPU |
Predecessor: | Apple A14 |
Successor: | Apple A16 |
Variant: | Apple M2[5] |
The Apple A15 Bionic is a 64-bit ARM-based system on a chip (SoC) designed by Apple Inc., part of the Apple silicon series. It is used in the iPhone 13 and 13 Mini, iPhone 13 Pro and 13 Pro Max, iPad Mini (6th generation), iPhone SE (3rd generation), iPhone 14 and 14 Plus and Apple TV 4K (3rd generation).[6]
Design
The Apple A15 Bionic features an Apple-designed 64-bit six-core CPU implementing ARMv8 with two high-performance cores called Avalanche running at 3.24 GHz and four energy-efficient cores called Blizzard running at 2.01 GHz. Apple claims the A15 in the iPhones is 50% faster than the competition. Apple claims the A15 in the iPad Mini 6 is 40% faster than the A12.[7] An in-depth breakdown by Anandtech revealed that "compared to the A14, the new A15 increases the peak single-core frequency of the two-performance core cluster by 8%, now reaching up to 3240MHz compared to the 2998MHz of the previous generation. When both performance cores are active, their operating frequency goes up by 10%, both now running at 3180MHz compared to the previous generation’s 2890MHz".[8] [9]
The A15 contains 15 billion transistors, a 27.1% increase from the A14's transistor count of 11.8 billion. It includes dedicated neural network hardware that Apple calls a new 16-core Neural Engine.[10] The Neural Engine can perform 15.8 trillion operations per second, faster than A14's 11 trillion operations per second (+ 43%). The A15 also includes a new image processor (ISP) with improved computational photography capabilities.[11] Apple also boosted performance by doubling the system cache to 32MB.[12]
The A15 has video codec encoding support for HEVC, H.264, and ProRes (iPhone 13 Pro only). It has decoding support for HEVC, H.264, MPEG‑4 Part 2, ProRes, and Motion JPEG.[13]
A15 is manufactured by TSMC, reportedly on their second-generation 5 nm fabrication process, N5P.[14] [15]
GPU
The A15 integrates an Apple-designed five-core GPU for the iPad mini (6th generation), iPhone 13 Pro and 13 Pro Max, iPhone 14 and 14 Plus and Apple TV 4K (3rd generation), though in the Apple TV variant one efficiency CPU core is disabled.[16] One GPU core is disabled in the iPhone SE (3rd generation), and iPhone 13 and 13 Mini, resulting in a four-core GPU for these models.[17]
Products
Products that include the Apple A15 Bionic are:
Variants
The table below shows the various SoCs based on the "Avalanche" and "Blizzard" microarchitectures.[19]
Variant | CPUcores (P+E)* | GPU cores | GPU EU | Graphics ALU | Neural Enginecores | Neural Engineperformance | Memory (GB) | Transistor count |
---|
A15 Bionic | 5 (2+3) | 5 | 80 | 640 | 16 | 15.8 TOPS | 4 | 15 billion |
6 (2+4) | 4 | 64 | 512 | 16 | 4 |
5 | 80 | 640 | 16 | 6 |
| 8 (4+4) | 8 | 128 | 1024 | 16 | 8–24 | 20 billion |
10 | 160 | 1280 | 16 |
| 10 (6+4) | 16 | 256 | 2048 | 16 | 16–32 | 40 billion |
12 (8+4) |
19 | 304 | 2432 | 16 |
M2 Max | 12 (8+4) | 30 | 480 | 3840 | 16 | 32–96 | 67 billion |
38 | 608 | 4864 | 16 |
| 24 (16+8) | 60 | 960 | 7680 | 32 | 31.6 TOPS | 64–192 | 134 billion |
76 | 1216 | 9728 | 32 | |
See also
- Apple silicon, range of ARM-based processors designed by Apple for their products
- Comparison of Armv8-A processors
Notes and References
- Web site: IPhone 13 Pro Geekbench Score Reveals A15 Bionic Frequency Upgrade; CPU/GPU Again Tops | SPARROWS NEWS . 16 September 2021 . 16 September 2021 . 22 September 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20220922174834/https://sparrowsnews.com/2021/09/16/iphone-13-pro-geekbench-score/ . live .
- Web site: Underclocked: The A15 chip inside Apple's new iPad mini 6 is slower than in the iPhone 13 . 16 September 2021 . 2021-09-17 . 2021-09-17 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210917125053/https://www.notebookcheck.net/Underclocked-The-A15-chip-inside-Apple-s-new-iPad-mini-6-is-slower-than-in-the-iPhone-13.562249.0.html . live .
- Web site: llvm-project/llvm/include/llvm/TargetParser/AArch64TargetParser.h at main · llvm/llvm-project · GitHub. GitHub. 30 November 2023. 30 November 2023.
- Web site: What's inside the Apple iPhone 13 Pro Teardown? . 2021-09-25 . 2021-09-25 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210925215239/https://www.techinsights.com/blog/teardown/apple-iphone-13-pro-teardown . live .
- Web site: Apple unveils M2, taking the breakthrough performance and capabilities of M1 even further . 2024-05-19 . 2022-06-06 . https://web.archive.org/web/20220606183353/https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2022/06/apple-unveils-m2-with-breakthrough-performance-and-capabilities/ . live.
- Web site: Apple A15 Bionic Powers iPhone 13 and iPad Mini. September 14, 2021. Tom's Hardware. September 14, 2021. September 22, 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220922174829/https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ipad-iphone-13-a15-bionic. live.
- News: Frumusanu. Andrei. September 14, 2021. Apple Announces iPhone 13 Series: A15, New Cameras, New Screens. AnandTech. September 15, 2021. May 14, 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220514013840/https://www.anandtech.com/show/16934/apple-announces-iphone-13-series. live.
- Web site: Apple's A15 Bionic announcements undersells improvements over A14. 2022-01-29. AppleInsider. 5 October 2021 . en. 2022-01-29. https://web.archive.org/web/20220129133043/https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/10/05/apples-a15-bionic-announcements-undersells-improvements-over-a14. live.
- Web site: Frumusanu. Andrei. The Apple A15 SoC Performance Review: Faster & More Efficient. 2022-01-29. www.anandtech.com. 2022-07-30. https://web.archive.org/web/20220730063639/https://www.anandtech.com/show/16983/the-apple-a15-soc-performance-review-faster-more-efficient. live.
- News: Shankland. Stephen. September 14, 2021. Apple's A15 Bionic chip powers iPhone 13 with 15 billion transistors, new graphics and AI. CNET. September 15, 2021. April 2, 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220402172646/https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/apples-a15-bionic-chip-powers-iphone-13-with-15-billion-transistors-new-graphics-and-ai/. live.
- Web site: Apple unveils iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 13 Pro Max — more pro than ever before. Apple Newsroom. 2021-09-14. 2021-09-15. https://web.archive.org/web/20210915145506/https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/09/apple-unveils-iphone-13-pro-and-iphone-13-pro-max-more-pro-than-ever-before/. live.
- Web site: Apple unveils new a15 bionic soc. ExtremeTech. 2021-09-16. 2022-04-21. https://web.archive.org/web/20220421192042/https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/327004-apple-unveils-new-a15-bionic-soc. live.
- Web site: iPhone 13 – Technical Specifications. 2021-10-24. support.apple.com. 2021-10-27. https://web.archive.org/web/20211027011552/https://support.apple.com/kb/SP851?locale=en_US. live.
- News: Hruska. Joel. September 15, 2021. Apple Unveils New A15 Bionic SoC. ExtremeTech. September 15, 2021. April 21, 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220421192042/https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/327004-apple-unveils-new-a15-bionic-soc. live.
- News: Sohail. Omar. March 30, 2021. Apple's A15 Bionic to Use TSMC's 'N5P' Process for the Upcoming iPhone 13 Series; Mass Production Could Start in May. Wccftech. September 15, 2021. September 16, 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210916034059/https://wccftech.com/apple-a15-bionic-mass-production-may-use-tsmc-n5p-node/. live.
- News: New Apple TV Reportedly Equipped With Binned A15 Chip With 5-Core CPU. 2022-11-14. Rossignol. Joe. macrumors.com. 2024-08-18.
- Web site: Espósito. Filipe. 2021-09-15. iPhone 13 Pro's A15 Bionic chip has more powerful GPU than regular iPhone 13. 2021-09-15. 9to5Mac. en-US. 2021-09-15. https://web.archive.org/web/20210915073016/https://9to5mac.com/2021/09/14/iphone-13-pros-a15-bionic-chip-has-more-powerful-gpu-than-regular-iphone-13/. live.
- Web site: Developing tvOS apps . Apple.
- Web site: Apple M2 Chip: Everything You Need to Know . 2022-07-30 . MacRumors . en.