AMD is seemingly slowing down the rhythm of its APU updates, as rumours indicate a drastic and unusual plan change. The upcoming Ryzen 9000G is said to be nothing more than a refreshed Ryzen 8000G, perhaps with a little frequency boost.
According to a leak coming from the Chiphell forums, AMD may keep its Zen 5 architecture for later APUs, meaning that the currently awaited 9000G will likely be a refresh of the existing Ryzen 8000G that’s based on the older Zen 4 design. Until now, the hope was that AMD would upgrade its Ryzen 9000G with Zen 5 CPU cores and RDNA 3.5 or RDNA 4 iGPUs, offering users a performant and efficient part for small-form-factor builds and retro gaming PCs.
However, if the Ryzen 9000G is just a refresh of the 8000G series, then it will likely max out at the same eight Zen 4 cores, 12 RDNA 3 compute units, plus XDNA NPU configuration, thus missing out on the power efficiency and performance uplifts of Zen 5, RDNA 3.5, and XDNA 2. But as usual, this information is to be taken with a grain of salt.
If true, this would be quite unusual as AMD has always used a new architecture with each APU generation. As a reminder, the Ryzen 2000G, 3000G, 4000G, and 5000G series were respectively powered by the Zen, Zen+, Zen 2, and Zen 3 architectures, while the latest Ryzen 8000G lineup featured Zen 4, which was the newest at the time. For those wondering, AMD never launched a 6000G or 7000G series, instead jumping straight to 8000G.
This raises another question concerning next-gen APUs. When the time comes for a Ryzen 10000G series, will AMD use Zen 6 or keep its APUs one generation behind again by opting for Zen 5? We surely hope for the former since APUs are very sought after for compact and efficient builds, therefore using older, less efficient architectures defies some of their appeal.
The good news is that the 8000G is still perfectly fine as is, especially on the CPU side, so those thinking about getting an APU shouldn’t be disappointed by its CPU prowess. The iGPU is still capable for older games, too, though lacking the new FSR 4 upscaling technology and improved ray tracing performance. And for those wanting more graphics horsepower, there is always the Strix Halo chips.
