Apple’s latest iPhone 16e features an A18 chip, but it features a 4-core GPU, which makes it slightly less competitive compared to the iPhone 16. Theoretically, it is the same chip that powers the flagship models but the binned chip could have a negative impact on the performance of the device.
iPhone 16e could feature inferior graphical performance than iPhone 16 due to the A18 chip’s one less GPU core
Apple has launched the iPhone 16e with a different approach and we were not expecting the device to be a miniaturised version of the iPhone 16 instead of an iPhone SE 3 successor. The device features the latest internals and also comes with the company’s custom C1 modem and its performance remains to be seen. However, the A18 chip in the device is a modified version of the same chip that powers the iPhone 16, but with a 4-core GPU.
Before the iPhone 16e was announced, Apple already had two variants of the chip – the A18 in the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus, and the A18 Pro in the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models. The A18 Pro chip features a 6-core GPU, and the standard version comes with a 5-core GPU. It appears that the company also has a third variant with a 4-core GPU and it will power the iPhone 16e. However, all models have 8GB of RAM, which means that there will be no differences in that department.
Chip binning is a quality control process in chip manufacturing, which means that instead of scrapping the chips that did not yield the number of expected cores. Apple would simply deactivate the faulty cores and keep the rest of the chip active and ready for use. The A17 Pro chip in the iPad mini 7 also has one less GPU core than the version on the iPhone 15 Pro.
This brings us to question if the iPhone 16e will have inferior performance compared to the rest of the lineup. For most users, the performance would not be an issue as the chip still features the same number of COU cores as the rest of the variants. However, for graphics-intensive tasks like playing high-end games could be noticeable. if you are not familiar, the A18 Pro chip in the iPhone 16 Pro models is 15 percent more powerful, which means that the performance gap would be even higher in comparison to the iPhone 16e. You can check more details on Apple’s official website.
We have to take real-world performance into account, so we would reserve our judgement until comparison tests are live. Even with a one less GPU core, you can be sure that the iPhone 16e will deliver better performance than most smartphones at this price point.
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