Intel's new 18A-P node will reportedly provide 9% higher performance and 18% better efficiency than 18A

News has emerged about Intel's next-generation manufacturing node, named 18A-P. The company has reportedly marked it "ready" after testing and publishing results that show impressive improvement over the current-gen 18A node. As a refresher, Intel Foundry is currently using the 18A process node to build the Panther Lake and Wildcat Lake processor lineups, with some external components from TSMC.

Now, the news comes from the preview tip sheet being circulated ahead of the Intel VLSI 2026 symposium, to be held in June. At the said symposium in Honolulu, Hawaii, Intel will unveil the full capabilities of the upcoming 18A-P node. However, the preview paper gives us a good idea of the kinds of improvements we can expect from the new node compared to the current 18A process.

The 18A-P node can reportedly deliver a 9% performance improvement over the 18A at the same power level. Flipping the equation, the new node can consume 18% less power than the 18A while delivering the same performance. This translates into a significant efficiency improvement, rare for a node refresh such as this. Usually, one would expect such an efficiency bump from a smaller node, such as the jump from 18A to 14A.

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Under the hood, the 18A-P brings some interesting changes and new features that make it a desirable refresh. Intel has improved the skew corners in the 18A-P node by 30%, which translates to a more predictable performance and power envelope. Another point of interest is the claimed 50% increase in thermal conductivity and reduced thermal resistance. Intel has added new features, including additional logic VT pairs and new low-power devices, across both high-density and high-performance libraries. These numbers are based on a reference design with an Arm core sub-block, but the premise still stands.

Intel has not yet revealed which clients will use its upcoming 18A-P production process, but industry sources have reported that Apple is on track to use Intel's 18A-P production node to build its M-series SoCs for MacBooks and iPads. That will be a huge deal for Intel, and it will mark another big success for Intel's Foundry shortly after securing Tesla as the first external client for its 14A production node.

The Intel VLSI 2026 Conference will be held from 14-18 June in Honolulu, Hawaii. We can expect Intel to officially unveil its 18A-P process node at that symposium, along with an updated potential roadmap of Intel Foundry moving forward. Safe to say, Intel seems to have turned around its initial misfortune in manufacturing and is now sailing full speed ahead.