MediaTek Breaks Through TSMC's 2nm Mobile Chip Performance

MediaTek has announced that it has become the first company to successfully develop a chip using the advanced N2P process with TSMC. At the same time, the manufacturer has completed the design of MediaTek's flagship system-on-chip (SoC) with the expectation of starting mass production by the end of next year.

MediaTek becomes the first partner to develop chips on TSMC's 2nm process. Photo: MediaTek NR

This is a new milestone marking the strong partnership between MediaTek and TSMC, continuing to bring high-performance, energy-efficient chipsets to customers across a wide range of applications, including flagship mobile devices, computing, automotive, data centers and many more.

TSMC's 2nm technology was the first to adopt the nanosheet transistor structure, and N2P is the next evolutionary step in the 2nm line, promising superior performance and power efficiency.

The first chipsets using TSMC's new N2P process are expected to be commercially available by the end of 2026.

In the hands of MediaTek, TSMC's 2nm chip brings a breakthrough in performance.

Compared to the current N3E process, N2P users can expect up to 18% performance increase at the same power consumption, about 36% power reduction at the same speed, and a 1.2x increase in logic density.

“MediaTek’s innovation on TSMC’s 2nm technology platform once again reaffirms our leadership in the industry, as we continue to pioneer the most advanced semiconductor processes for a wide range of devices and applications,” said Joe Chen, President of MediaTek.

“Our ongoing collaboration with MediaTek is focused on maximizing performance and power efficiency across a wide range of applications,” said Dr. Kevin Zhang, Senior Vice President of Global Sales & Business Development and Deputy Co-CEO of TSMC.

Oppo will likely be one of the first smartphone makers to use the MediaTek Dimensity 9600 in the Find X10 series.

Qualcomm has yet to make any official announcements about its 2-nanometer chips, but we're likely to hear more at the Snapdragon 2025 Summit next Tuesday (September 23).

Regardless, Snapdragon won't be much slower in reaching the 2nm process so that it can launch the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 chip by the end of 2026.

The announcement of the 2-nanometer Exynos 2600 chip has not been officially confirmed, although there are many reliable sources in the media who have confirmed it. Samsung Foundry is now seeing the need for urgent action after the disaster with the Exynos 2500.