CES 2026: Intel hopes its Core Extremely Sequence 3 chips are the beginning of a comeback

Intel turned as much as CES 2026 to herald the start of the Core Extremely Sequence 3, a brand new vary of chips providing “distinctive efficiency.” It says the cellular processors, previously generally known as Panther Lake, ship nice graphics and battery life alongside the aforementioned grunt. And that, for the primary time, the silicon has been licensed for embedded and industrial use circumstances, together with robotics and good cities. However, like so many tales about Intel lately, the launch is loaded with a lot subtext you’ll want a duplicate of Cliffs Notes to grasp it.

On the face of it, these are just a few snappy flagship chips, accessible in Core Extremely 7 and 9 ranges in addition to Core X7 and X9, which ship with 12 Xe graphics cores over the standard 4. Nearly all of them provide 16 complete cores and threads, and all bar two have complete NPU efficiency of fifty PTOPS.

These chips are going to be well-known for 2 key causes: First, Intel claims they’re essentially the most superior chips ever manufactured within the US. Second, they’re the primary to be made utilizing Intel’s lengthy awaited 18A course of, which has dogged the corporate for a number of years. 18A was a key plank of former CEO Pat Gelsinger’s rescue plan to revive Intel to the highest of the chip world. However sadly that comeback didn’t come quick sufficient to forestall the CEO from being (unfairly, in my thoughts) deposed on the finish of 2024. It didn’t assist that, for all the cash spent on 18A, as not too long ago as August 2025, the corporate was reportedly nonetheless affected by low yields and excessive defect charges.

18A is brief for 18 Angstrom, a measurement that’s far smaller than the nanometers we at present use to indicate transistor measurement in chips. 18 Angstrom is roughly equal to 1.8 nanometers, placing it on the identical tough stage as essentially the most superior manufacturing course of — N2 — accessible at TSMC in Taiwan. At CES, Intel’s new CEO Lip Bu-Tan mentioned the corporate was now forward of schedule for ramping manufacturing on 18A, which may mark an essential shift within the world chip market.

You need to anticipate to see these chips present up in laptops from all the standard suspects, together with HP, Acer, Lenovo, Dell, Samsung and the remaining throughout this 12 months.