In the coming months, Intel will launch its 13th Gen Raptor Lake CPUs but the rumor mill is already talking about the 14th Gen Meteor Lake and 15th Gen Arrow Lake CPUs which will be arriving on a brand new desktop CPU platform based around the LGA 2551 socket.
Intel 14th Gen Meteor Lake & 15th Gen Arrow Lake Desktop CPUs To Launch in 2023-2024 On New LGA 2551 Socket Platform
The latest details come from Moore's Law is Dead where it is stated that Intel is expected to launch its 14th Gen Meteor Lake CPUs in 2023 and 15th Gen Arrow Lake CPUs in 2024. Now both of these lineups have been confirmed by Intel themselves including the generations beyond that which are codenamed Lunar Lake and Nova Lake. The key detail in the latest video is that both families will be utilizing a brand new socket known as LGA 2551.
The Intel LGA 2551 socket will be replacing the current LGA 1700/1800 socket which supports both 12th Gen Alder Lake and 13th Gen Raptor Lake CPUs. Intel is known to transition to newer sockets every 2 generations. The LGA 1200 socket also supported the 10th Gen Comet Lake and 11th Gen Rocket Lake CPUs. While the socket remains the same, each CPU brings a host of improvements to the I/O which are enabled through newer chips. The same philosophy is used by AMD and Intel as we see several chipset revisions and updates on the same socket.
According to the details, the Intel LGA 2551 socket for Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake CPUs will have exact measurements of 38mm x 46mm and will only be slightly bigger than the existing LGA 1700 / 1800 socket which means those 2551 pins might be packed tightly compared to current designs so that the socket doesn't take a whole lot of space on mainstream platforms. This will make the Intel LGA 2551 socket the biggest for mainstream desktop PCs, incorporating 751 more pins than Intel's current mainstream socket and 833 more pins than AMD's AM5 socket (LGA 1718). With the socket out of the way, let's take a quick look at both the Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake CPU families.
Intel LGA 2551 Socket (Image Credits: Moore's Law is Dead):
Intel 14th Gen Meteor Lake CPUs: Intel 4 Process Node, Tiled Arc GPU Design, Hybrid Cores, 2023 Launch To Tackle Zen 5
The 14th Gen Meteor Lake CPUs are going to be a gamer changer in the sense that they will adopt a brand new tiled architecture approach. Based on the 'Intel 4' process node, the new CPUs will be offering a 20% improvement in performance per watt through EUV technology and are set to tape out by 2H 2022 (manufacturing-ready). The first Meteor Lake CPUs are scheduled to ship out by 1H 2023 and availability is expected later the same year. The desktop parts are rumored to hit shelves by the second half of 2023 and will tackle AMD's Zen 5 CPUs by the time they launch.
According to Intel, the 14th Gen Meteor Lake CPUs will feature a brand new tiled architecture and what this basically means is that the company has decided to go full-on chiplet. There are 4 main tiles on the Meteor Lake CPUs. There's the IO Tile, the SOC Tile, the GFX Tile & the Compute Tile. The Compute Tile comprises the CPU Tile and GFX Tile. The CPU Tile will be making use of a new hybrid core design consisting of Redwood Cove P-Cores and Crestmont E-Cores, delivering higher-performance throughput at lower power while the graphics tile will be unlike anything we have seen before. The CPUs will scale from 5 to 125W which is from ultra-low TDP mobile to high-end desktop PCs.
As Raja Koduri states, the Meteor Lake CPUs will be utilizing a tiled Arc graphics powered GPU which will make it an entirely new class of graphics on a chip. It's neither an iGPU nor a dGPU & currently regarded as tGPU (Tiled GPU / Next-Gen Graphics Engine). The Meteor Lake CPUs will utilize the brand new Xe-HPG graphics architecture, allowing for increased performance at the same level of power efficiency as existing integrated GPUs. This will also enable enhanced support for DirectX 12 Ultimate and XeSS, features that are only supported by the Alchemist lineup as of right now.
Intel 15th Gen Lunar Lake CPUs: Intel 20A Process Node, Brand New Lion Cove Core 'Possible Jim Keller Design' & Competing Against Zen 6
The follow-up to Meteor Lake is Arrow Lake and the 15th Gen lineup brings with it a lot of changes. While it would be socket compatible with whatever Meteor Lake lands on, the Redwood Cove cores and Crestmont cores will be upgraded to the brand new Lion Cove and Skymont cores. These are expected to bring a major advantage with the uplifted core counts which are expected to be 40/48 on the new SKUs (8 P-Cores + 32 E-Cores).
A previous leak had confirmed the desktop 'K' series mainstream parts. The performance is said to achieve parity with AMD and Apple processors which would mean that these would offer a double-digit gain. There's no information regarding the GFX Tile but it should either feature an updated architecture or increased Xe cores. The I/O tile will be fused with Neural Engines (VPU), similar to the ones on Meteor Lake, which will utilize low-power Atom cores.
Surprisingly, Intel would skip its 'Intel 4' node and jump directly to 20A for the Arrow Lake CPUs. One thing that's true for both Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake chips is that they will retain their N3 (TSMC) process node for additional core IPs, presumably the Arc GPU cores. The Intel 20A node delivers a 15% improvement in performance per watt, utilizing next-gen RibbonFET & PowerVia tech, and is scheduled to have the first IP test wafers running in fabs by the second half of 2022.
So it looks like for mobility at least, Intel would be going the more efficient route as they will utilize a fraction of the full core configuration that the desktop chips will get. Also, there will be a four-chiplet design for Arrow Lake, the same as Meteor Lake but with more cores and IO features. The 20A process node itself will bring a 15% improvement in performance per watt and introduce RibbonFET & PowerVia tech to the table.
Intel Mainstream CPU Generations Comparison:
| Intel CPU Family | Processor Process | Processor Architecture | Graphics Architecture | Processors Cores/Threads (Max) | Platform | Memory Support | PCIe Support | Launch |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alder Lake (12th Gen) | Intel 7 | Golden Cove (P-Core) Gracemont (E-Core) | HD 700 Series | 16/24 | LGA 1700/1800 | DDR5 / DDR4 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2021 |
| Raptor Lake (13th Gen) | Intel 7 | Raptor Cove (P-Core) Gracemont (E-Core) | HD 700 Series | 24/32 | LGA 1700/1800 | DDR5 / DDR4 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2022 |
| Raptor Lake Refresh (14th Gen) | Intel 7 | Raptor Cove (P-Core) Gracemont (E-Core) | HD 700 Series | 24/32 | LGA 1700/1800 | DDR5 / DDR4 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2023 |
| Meteor Lake | Intel 4 | Redwood Cove (P-Core) Crestmont (E-Core) | Xe1 (Alchemist) | 22/28 | LGA 1851 | DDR5 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2024 |
| Arrow Lake | TSMC N3B | Lion Cove (P-Core) Skymont (E-Core) | Xe1 (Alchemist) | 24/24 | LGA 1851 | DDR5 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2024 |
| Arrow Lake Refresh | TSMC N3B | Lion Cove (P-Core) Skymont (E-Core) | Xe1 (Alchemist) | 24/24 | LGA 1851 | DDR5 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2026 |
| Lunar Lake | TSMC N3B | Lion Cove (P-Core) Skymont (E-Core) | Xe2 (Battlemage) | 8/8 | Mobile Only | LPDDR5X | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2024 |
| Panther Lake | Intel 18A | Cougar Cove (P-Core) Darkmont (E-Core) | Xe3 (Battlemage) | 16/16 | Mobile Only | LPDDR5/LPDDR5X | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2025 |
| Raptor Lake Next | Intel 7 | Raptor Cove (P-Core) Gracemont (E-Core) | HD 700 Series | 20/24 | LGA 1700/1800 | DDR5 / DDR4 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2027 |
| Nova Lake | Intel 18A | Coyote Cove (P-Core) Arctic Wolf (E-Core) | Xe3 (Battlemage) Xe3P (Celestial) | 52/52 | LGA 1954 | DDR5 | PCIe Gen 5.0 | 2027 |
| Razor Lake | Intel 18A? | Griffin Cove (P-Core) Golden Eagle (E-Core) | TBA | TBA | LGA 1954 | DDR5 | PCIe Gen 5.0? | 2027 |
| Titan Lake | TBA | Copper Shark (Unified) Golden Eagle (E-Core) | TBA | TBA | Mobile Only | LPDDR6? | PCIe Gen 5.0? | 2028 |
With that said, Intel is expected to disclose new details on its 14th Gen Meteor Lake and 15th Gen Arrow Lake CPUs at HotChip34 in August so we will be getting a bit more information regarding the next-gen chip lineup from team Blue.
About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.
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