Intel announces Thunderbolt 4, but it's not faster than Thunderbolt 3

Intel announced the Tiger Lake family of mobile processors. Besides the AI accelerator and integrated Intel Xe graphics, the new CPU family will debut with Thunderbolt 4 support – the latest iteration of Intel’s external connector.

Strangely, it seems that the new standard will not be faster than Thunderbolt 3. Details are scarce, but Intel says its four times faster than USB 3.1 (10Gbps), meaning it tops out at 40Gbps – the same speed as v3.

The new Thunderbolt standards use the same plug as USB-C and are compatible with it. It’s not clear if the new standard is based on PCIe 4.0 or not (Thunderbolt 3 used PCIe 3.0) or what other advantages v4 might bring – Intel will announce the full details at a later date.

Note that the upcoming USB 4 is based on Thunderbolt 3 and can reach the same speeds. Also, it’s royalty-free, so it should gain wider adoption than Thunderbolt (which is mostly found on Apple computers).

Anyway, Tiger Lake chips will be built on a 10nm+ process, the first computers to use it will ship later this year. The Xe graphics architecture will also be used for a discrete GPU, known only as DG1 for now.

USB4 announced with 40Gbps bandwidth, it's based on Thunderbolt 3

Intel and the USB-IF have announced the next evolution in “do it all” cables – USB4. It will double the available bandwidth over the newly-renamed USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 to 40Gbps. With that much throughput, a single cable can handle multiple simultaneous display out and data streams. It can drive two 4K displays at 60Hz, for example.

USB4 isn’t entirely a new protocol, however. It builds on Thunderbolt 3, which Intel just contributed to the USB group and made available for royalty-free implementation. USB4 will still be fully backwards compatible with the older USB 2.0 and 3.2 standards.

Note that you’ll need 40Gbps-certified cables to hit the maximum speed. We’re talking USB-C to USB-C cables only, the USB-A plug doesn’t have enough connectors (no, not even the USB3 ones).

Thunderbolt has mostly been used by Apple so far (because of its proprietary status), but Intel is working with Microsoft to ensure trouble-free support on Windows 10 and it hasn’t forgotten about Linux computers either.

Now over 50 companies are participating in the final stages of the USB4 certification, which will be published in the middle of this year. Considering that USB 3.2 was announced in 2017 and still hasn't seen wide adoption, USB4 is probably a few years away from consumer hands.