The elusive 10 nm Core i7-1068G7 will be Intel's short-term response to the impending 7 nm AMD Ryzen 7 4700U

When Intel unveiled its lineup of Ice Lake SKUs back in August of 2019, the family would consist of at least 5 different Y-series CPUs and 6 different U-series CPUs. The highest-end U-series option would be the Core i7-1068G7 operating at 28 W followed by the Core i7-1065G7 at 15 W to 25 W. The latter processor has already made its way to most high-end Ultrabooks including the Razer Blade Stealth, HP Spectre x360, and the Dell XPS 13. The Core i7-1068G7, however, is still nowhere to be found.

Intel is expected to make available the Core i7-1068G7 to OEMs before the end of Q1 2020 for a launch in Q2 or later which also happens to be when the competing third generation mobile AMD Ryzen CPUs will launch. The eight-core eight-thread Ryzen 7 4700U is therefore expected to go head-to-head with the quad-core eight-thread Core i7-1068G7. The comparisons should be interesting as the 7 nm Renoir family is rumored to outperform both the 10 nm Ice Lake and 14 nm Comet Lake-U series in CPU and GPU horsepower.

There is a small chance that Intel will reserve the Core i7-1068G7 to NUCs or mini PC form factors only much like on the 2018 NUC8i7BEH and its Core i7-8559U. That particular 28 W CPU, while powerful, did not go on to appear on any mass-produced laptop. Should Intel decide to do the same with the 28 W Core i7-1068G7, then the chipmaker will have no answer to the upcoming Ryzen 4000U series until the launch of Tiger Lake-U even later in the year.