Google is reportedly working on its own wearable-focused custom Tensor chipset, and is scheduled to launch it by 2026 with the Google Pixel Watch 5, and alongside the Tensor G6 smartphone chip.
First reported by Android Authority, this piece of information is extracted from documents that have been leaked from Google’s gChips division.
New chipset but with old internals?
Codenamed “NPT”, the wearable Tensor SoC is said to feature 1x Arm Cortex-A78 and 2x Arm Cortex-A55. But wait a minute, isn’t this chipset supposed to be new?
But why are its internals, well, ancient? The Cortex-A78 was launched back in 2020, while the Cortex-A55 has already been around since 2017.
Wear OS has historically struggled with good chipset offerings
If you’ve paid attention to the evolution of the Wear OS platform, and to a certain extent, Android Wear, you will notice that the operating system has not always been given the best options when it comes to chipsets.
Qualcomm, the biggest chipset manufacturer in the Wear OS space, is also known for its sluggish pace in introducing chipsets for wearables. Worse yet, the chipsets it made were often not only old in technology but also lagged behind the competition in performance (think Snapdragon Wear 2100, 3100, 4100).
In fact, the last time Qualcomm introduced a wearable SoC was back in mid-2022, in the form of the Snapdragon W5 Gen 1 and W5+ Gen 1 chips. That was over two years ago. Since then, the silicon SoC maker has gone radio silent.
When Google’s first in-house smartwatch, the original Pixel Watch, made its launch in 2022, it was fitted with a ridiculously outdated Samsung Exynos chip. This was a result of the product being released one year later than it was initially scheduled.
Google then played catch up the next year by fitting its Pixel Watch 2 with a more modern Snapdragon W5+ Gen 1 chip. The most recent Google Pixel Watch 3, which was just introduced in August this year (2024), also packs the same chipset, as it’s most probably the best option Google’s got out there.
Making Android wearable chipsets great again?
With the choices Google is given, it’s no surprise that the company decided to take matters into its own hands by building its own wearable chipset, eliminating its reliance on chip providers such as Qualcomm.
At the end of the day, do keep in mind that the leaked document was published back in early 2023, so there are possibilities that things could have changed. Still, if Google is indeed planning to build better chipsets for its wearables, we hope this could help the company make even better smartwatches, especially for Android consumers.
Fans of Android wearables, including myself, have been waiting for an ultimate “no compromise” Android smartwatch that can truly compete with the Apple Watch head-to-head. The Pixel Watch 3 is probably the best bet the platform has thus far, but is still behind in certain aspects such as its chipset. Could Google’s plan to build its own wearable chipset help realise that dream?
