The Apple M1 chip was introduced in MacBook Pro laptops, MacBook Air, and Mac mini desktop. The company’s next series of chips, scheduled for release next spring and fall, will be designed for higher-performance MacBook Pro laptops, entry-level and high-end desktop iMacs, and later the new Mac Pro workstation.

The plans show that Apple is confident that it will be able to offer the market truly good products of its own, and therefore the Cupertino giant is taking decisive steps to completely abandon Intel Core processors in its devices. Apple’s next two chip families of 2021 will also be more ambitious than some industry observers expected. Apple has officially announced that it plans to complete the transition from Intel to use its own chips in 2022.

While Intel earns less than 10% of its revenue from its partnership with Apple, the PC business could also suffer if the new Macs significantly outperform Windows computers. It could shake things up in an industry that has long depended on Intel’s pace of innovation. By taking this step, Apple is relieving itself of such dependence and strengthening its differences from the rest of the PC market, getting the opportunity to increase its share.

Apple’s current M1 chip inherits a design aimed at mobile devices such as the iPhone and iPad: this single-chip system uses four high-performance CPU cores and four energy-efficient cores along with graphics blocks, microprocessors, and so on. Apple is working on a die with 16 powerful and 4 energy-efficient cores for its next-generation chip for the MacBook Pro and iMac models, sources said. However, the first computers can get crystals in which only 8 or 12 high-performance cores will work – depending on the yield of suitable crystals.

For higher-end desktops slated for late 2021 and the new Mac Pro (which will be half the size of today’s) in 2022, Apple is testing an SoC design with 32 high-performance cores. Today’s high-end Apple laptops offer a maximum of eight CPU cores, the high-end iMac Pro up to 18 cores, and the most expensive desktop Mac Pro can offer up to 28 cores.

Apple engineers are also developing more ambitious GPUs. Today’s M1 chips are offered with Apple graphics that include 7 or 8 cores. Apple is testing 16- and 32-core options for its future high-performance laptops and mid-range desktops.

And the more powerful Macs coming in 2021 or 2022 will be able to offer 64- or 128-core graphics. According to Bloomberg sources, it will be several times more powerful than AMD’s current accelerators used in Mac computers. However, whether we are talking about discrete graphics cards or powerful integrated graphics is not clear.