Leaker reveals unwelcome consequence of Apple, MediaTek and Qualcomm adopting TSMC's 2 nm nodes for 2027 flagships

The adoption of TSMC's N2 manufacturing process by many of the smartphone market's key players is no secret. However, Digital Chat Station has offered new insights into how future flagships could be affected by TSMC's new node. To recap, Economic Times Daily reported towards the end of last month that Apple A20 chipsets would adopt 2 nm nodes in a change from the 3 nm nodes used across its A18 and A19 predecessors.

Apparently, the switch from 3 nm to 2 nm wafers could deliver a 15% performance improvement on the same package size without incurring a power consumption uplift. Shortly afterwards, Digital Chat Station suggested that Qualcomm had decided to use the same nodes for the Snapdragon 8 Elite 3 that it has codenamed 'SM8950'.

As it stands, the leaker still cites 2026 as the release window for these chipsets. Now, they have added MediaTek to the companies that will adopt TSMC's N2 nodes. On top of that, Digital Chat Station claims that this new node is costing TSMC 'significantly' more to produce than its 3 nm equivalents. Supposedly, these costs will be passed on to the consumer in the form of price increases for future flagships like the Apple iPhone 18, Oppo Find X10, Samsung Galaxy S27 and Vivo X400 series, among others.

Based on MediaTek's current release schedule, it will introduce the Dimensity 9500 this autumn before refreshing it with the Dimensity 9500+ in spring 2026. In recent years, MediaTek's mid-cycle refreshes have only brought minor improvements to the table, as with the Dimensity 9300+ inside the likes of the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus (curr. $849.99 on Amazon). Consequently, we suspect that the first 2 nm-based MediaTek chipset will be the Dimensity 9600 rather than the Dimensity 9500+.