Microsoft's new Xbox Series consoles now use 6nm chips--something that we predicted back in 2022.
The newer digital-only Xbox Series X and 1TB Xbox Series S models now use 6nm chips. The new SoCs were discovered by YouTuber Austin Evans, who tore down the new consoles in a recent video.
To be clear, the newer Xbox consoles are not more powerful in regards to CPU and GPU performance. The 6nm chip has many benefits, including a slight power usage reduction, but most of the benefits are on the production side of things. The 6nm SoCs used in the new Series X and Series S consoles are part of TSMC's N7 family, and are still part of the same family as previous models. The N7 family includes 7nm, 7nm+ (the launch 2020 models), and 6nm (the new revised models).
Sony has also moved to 6nm for its PlayStation 5 consoles, and it's likely that the PlayStation 5 Pro will also be built on 6nm as well, depending on the extent of the customized chipset used in the new console. In fact, Sony had moved to 6nm in 2022 with its newer lighter PS5 models, and then also used 6nm and newly adjusted internals and chassis designs for its current PS5 Slim model.
Like Sony, Microsoft is simply issuing a console refresh in an effort to reduce costs. Every Xbox console is produced at a loss, but now it can be produced--and shipped--at less of a loss.
The new models are lighter thanks to new cooling solutions which have reduced weight by around 12%, and the move to 6nm is to improve chip yields and reduce production wastes. We've outlined the benefits in our coverage from 2022.
"As its design rules are compatible with N7 technology, N6 technology can significantly reduce customers' product design cycle time and time-to-market," TSMC said in PR documents.