Intel Begins Production of Panther Lake Chips Promising 50% Performance Boost

With its latest processors now in production, Intel is taking a bold gamble by predicting that graphics chips, not dedicated neural engines, will be the key to AI computing in the future. The company’s most aggressive performance boost in years, the Core Ultra series 3, codenamed Panther Lake, represents a fundamental shift from the way all other chipmakers are addressing artificial intelligence.

Intel’s new Panther Lake chips demonstrate more than 50% performance gains in both processing and graphics when compared to current models, doubling down on a contentious approach: delivering AI power through graphics chips rather than specialised neural engines.

Panther Lake Runs on Intel’s 18A Process

Panther Lake is powered by Intel’s 18A process, which was the first 2-nanometre technology created and produced in the United States. This week, Panther Lake began production at Chandler, Arizona’s Fab 52. RibbonFET transistors and a modified power delivery mechanism that channels energy via the backside of the device allow the new architecture to fit 30% more transistors onto each chip while using 15% less power.

 As part of Intel’s $100 billion wager on homegrown manufacturing, CEO Lip-Bu Tan presented the milestone as essential to the future of American tech leadership. The company’s sixth sizeable Arizona location is Fab 52 in Chandler.

Intel Following Different Path Compared to its Competitors

Neural processing units are the focus of every chipmaker, but Intel took a different approach. The new Xe 3 graphics architecture from the business can perform 120 trillion operations per second for AI activities, which is almost twice as fast as the previous generation. The NPU crept from 48 to 50 TOPS with little movement.

The first goods will be released in January 2026, and Panther Lake will power everything from industrial robots to laptops. Using the same 2-nanometre manufacturing technique, Intel is also producing a 288-core server chip called Clearwater Forest, which will be released the following year.