7 nm process

In semiconductor manufacturing, the "7 nm" process is a marketing term for the MOSFET technology node following the "10 nm" node, defined by the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors. It is based on FinFET (fin field-effect transistor) technology, a type of multi-gate MOSFET technology.

The phrase "7 nm" does not refer to any dimension on the integrated circuits, and has no relation to gate length, metal pitch, or gate pitch; since at least 1997, "node" has become a commercial name for marketing purposes that indicates new generations of process technologies, without any relation to physical properties. However, the smallest dimension within an individual transistor, the fin width, can sometimes be 7 nm. TSMC and Samsung's "10 nm" (10 LPE) processes are somewhere between Intel's "14 nm" and "10 nm" processes in transistor density.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) began production of 256 Mbit SRAM memory chips using a "7 nm" process called N7 in June 2016, before Samsung began mass production of their "7 nm" process called 7LPP devices in 2018. The first mainstream "7 nm" mobile processor intended for mass market use, the Apple A12 Bionic, was released at Apple's September 2018 event. Although Huawei announced its own "7 nm" processor before the Apple A12 Bionic, the Kirin 980 on August 31, 2018, the Apple A12 Bionic was released for public, mass market use to consumers before the Kirin 980. Both chips were manufactured by TSMC.

In 2019, AMD released their "Rome" (EPYC 2) processors for servers and datacenters, which are based on TSMC's N7 node and feature up to 64 cores and 128 threads. They also released their "Matisse" consumer desktop processors with up to 16 cores and 32 threads. However, the I/O die on the Rome multi-chip module (MCM) is fabricated with the GlobalFoundries' 14 nm (14HP) process, while the Matisse's I/O die uses the GlobalFoundries' "12 nm" (12LP+) process. The Radeon RX 5000 series is also based on TSMC's N7 process.