Intel says 14A will be within 5% of TSMC’s A14

Clock-based estimates vary with the reference chip and do not predict future CPU speeds.

Updated 28 September 2026

Intel expects its 14A process to perform within 5% of TSMC’s A14, a comparison that does not reveal which company’s node is faster. Intel projects a 15%–20% performance gain for 14A over 18A at equal power, while TSMC forecasts a 10%–15% gain for A14 over N2 on the same basis. Applying those projections to current CPU clock examples, the article estimates a 2%–11.3% possible 14A advantage using Intel’s 5.10 GHz Core Ultra X9 388H and AMD’s 5.00 GHz EPYC 9586F as starting points; using Apple’s 4.78 GHz M6 instead produces a 6.5%–16.2% range. These figures are illustrative calculations, not predictions of future chip frequencies, because they apply process projections to chips with different designs and implementations. The gap between Intel’s “within 5%” assessment and the article’s calculations remains unexplained by the sources.