Apple TV Set for Major Upgrade: A17 Pro Chip to Bring AI and Gaming Capabilities

A new Apple TV 4K is coming soon: will it support Apple Intelligence? - 9to5Mac

A hardware refresh for the Apple TV 4K set-top box is coming soon. The current generation was released in spring 2022, and is powered by an A15 Bionic chip. The new generation is expected to feature a new Apple-designed WiFi and Bluetooth chip, as well as a CPU upgrade. A report from MacRumors today cites code references that indicate the box will actually get an A17 Pro chip, the same processor that powers the iPhone 15 Pro. The jump from A15 to A17 obviously will provide a nice boost to CPU and GPU performance, approximately 15-30% increases as tested by synthetic benchmarks. However, the bigger breakpoint is the A17 Pro chip was the first A-series chip to support Apple Intelligence and all of the associated large language model features that brings. As Apple Intelligence is a combination of on-device and server infrastructure, it requires compatible devices to have relatively powerful computational power, as well as ample RAM. As such, the current Apple TV is not powerful enough to run Apple Intelligence features, but a new Apple TV powered by A17 Pro could be. However, even if the chip is technically capable, it's currently unclear what Apple's plans are for Apple Intelligence in the living room. Most of the current suite of Apple Intelligence features do not really translate to a set-top box environment. For instance, flagship Apple Intelligence features like writing tools, notification summaries, and visual intelligence do not make sense for Apple TV. Perhaps Apple could upgrade tvOS with TV-specific AI features, like the ability to jump to a particular scene in a TV show just by describing it with natural language. You can also imagine how a significantly upgraded Siri could make the Apple TV experience much better. But Apple is currently in the process of overhauling Siri with new foundations, a project that won't ship until the spring of 2026 at the earliest. As such, I don't really think the next Apple TV will be marketed based on Apple Intelligence features. The A17 Pro chip will give the Apple TV better performance for games, and future-proof it so that it might be able to take advantage of new Siri capabilities down the road. Assuming the new Apple TV launches in 2025, it will probably be presented as a relatively low-key spec-bump refresh. Maybe the remote will finally add a speaker so you can use Find My to make it beep when you inevitably lose it down the back of the couch.

New Apple TV 4K biggest upgrades just leaked ahead of launch

A new report suggests that Apple's refreshed set-top box could be kitted with the A17 Pro chip, which was used in the iPhone 15 Pro, allowing it major gains in performance. As reported by MacRumors, the updated processor should give this fourth generation Apple TV 4K as much as a 15% to 30% boost in both CPU and GPU workloads. Aside from that, the A17 Pro processor also supports Apple Intelligence, which could be a major game-changer for the new Apple TV 4K. The current third generation hardware, released in 2022, still uses the A15 bionic chip, and neither its RAM capacity nor its underlying software infrastructure allows it any compatibility with Apple Intelligence. But, it's still unclear what Apple even wants to do with its AI. Specifically, when it comes to set-top boxes and Apple TV Plus. Rumors have been circulating for months on the potential launch of a refreshed Apple TV 4K, which would make sense, seeing as we haven't seen a new model in nearly three years. Still, it's not quite like the third generation Apple TV 4K is showing its age, but several improvements would definitely be fitting. A major upgrade being tossed around for the new set-top box is a new processor in the A17 Pro chip, which was first made available on the iPhone 15 Pro. MacRumors claims it saw code references that point to the A17 Pro, allowing the streaming device 15%-30% improvements in benchmarked CPU and GPU performance. Other huge advancements purportedly arriving on the new streaming device include an Apple-designed Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chip, which is being referred to internally as "Proxima." It's suggested this chip will support Bluetooth 5.3 and Wi-Fi 6E, or even Wi-Fi 7 as some other insiders theorize. If these upgrades already wouldn't shoot it to the top of the best streaming devices list, the potential inclusion of Apple Intelligence on-device most certainly would. This has been a long-sought-after upgrade for several Apple products, but its debut on the fourth generation Apple TV 4K could be a major game-changer. But the most important question still remains: what exactly would Apple Intelligence be good for on this new set-top box? Apple still doesn't quite have a plan for its AI just yet, at least in terms of its use case on something like the Apple TV 4K. The potential is definitely staggering, especially when you look at both Google Gemini and Amazon Alexa Plus and what they both bring to the table for navigation, search, and recommendations. Even Gemini's AI wallpaper generation is pretty fun to play with. As for Apple, though, mum's still the word. Even when it comes to more basic implementations, Apple has yet to really voice what Apple Intelligence could be good for aside from summarizing notifications, translations, and more general writing advancements. Apple's Visual Intelligence definitely wouldn't translate at all to the Apple TV 4K, unless it worked in a way that read what's on the screen for certain information, like shopping for the sunglasses Brad Pitt is wearing in F1 or giving you location data on where a particular shot takes place. That would actually be pretty nifty, but it's hard to say if that's what Apple is going for with Apple Intelligence on its new set-top box. Apple is also working on completely overhauling Siri for new underlying features, as well. That could also prove pretty remarkable if implemented on the device, but this new version of Siri is slated for debut in 2026. However, Apple's AI functionality takes shape on the new streaming box, it is clear that a refresh for the Apple TV 4K is sorely needed. We won't know if these rumors prove accurate until early September, when Apple shows off all its new products, including the Apple iPhone 17.

Apple TV Could Get A Chipset Upgrade Later This Year That Will Give It The Ability To Potentially Run Generative AI Features And AAA Games Effortlessly

The primary selling point of an Apple TV was primarily locked to streaming, with casual gamers able to pass the time with non-AAA titles, with similar apps and clones also present on Google's Play Store. However, later this year, an updated model could expand the number of activities being done on that compact box, as Apple is rumored to introduce a chipset upgrade that will not just be able to run generative AI features, but also fire up console-quality games. Care to guess what this silicon will be called? The A17 Pro was officially announced in September 2023 and was Apple's first 3nm chipset powering the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max. It also provided hardware-accelerated ray tracing support and the ability to run the same AAA games featured on the Xbox Series X, PS5, and PC. The same SoC will now make its way to an updated Apple TV model, with MacRumors reporting that leaked code mentioned this vital information. It is unsurprising that Apple will re-purpose the A17 Pro to be featured in the new Apple TV. The company has utilized the same hardware in its portable iPad mini 7, and being outfitted in a larger chassis means that the Apple Silicon can perform to its fullest potential. When the first tests showed the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max running titles like Resident Evil Village, it was astounding to see that two compact devices with constrained thermal designs could push decent framerates with a smartphone silicon. With the upgrade coming to the Apple TV, the A17 Pro also sports a capable Neural Engine to run on-device generative AI features, but the company needs to provide a polished service on that front. Unfortunately, nothing else is known about the newer Apple TV, so we have to wait for more updates to come through and as always, we will relay the necessary information down your path.