The big picture: Following an eventful few days marked by the unveiling of the Arc Battlemage B570 and B580 graphics cards and the surprise retirement of CEO Pat Gelsinger, Intel has confirmed that it is actively developing its next-generation GPUs. While progress on the Xe3 architecture is proceeding as expected, reports suggest that Team Blue has already begun laying the groundwork for its successor.
Speaking on The Full Nerd podcast, Intel's Tom Petersen reaffirmed the company's commitment to its Arc graphics business, dismissing any speculation about its potential cancellation. According to Petersen, Intel is moving full steam ahead with the development of Xe3. He revealed that the hardware for Xe3 is already "baked," and the software team is currently refining it, while the hardware team has begun work on its successor.
Petersen did not rule out the possibility of a faster Arc Xe2 graphics card in the future. However, he emphasized that Intel's primary focus remains on the newly announced B-series cards. He also clarified that the company's GPU release schedule follows a cadence longer than one year, implying that Xe3-based discrete cards may not debut before 2026.
Petersen's remarks confirm that Xe3 GPUs are very much alive and on track, quelling speculation about Intel potentially exiting the graphics card market due to lukewarm reception of its current offerings.
Codenamed Celestial, the Xe3 architecture is being designed with enthusiasts in mind and is expected to appear as an integrated GPU in Intel's upcoming Panther Lake and Nova Lake processors. While there were initial doubts about desktop variants, Petersen's interview and a previous leak strongly suggest that Xe3-based discrete SKUs are also under active development.
Earlier this week, Intel announced its Battlemage gaming GPUs, starting with the mid-range Arc B570 and B580 models. These cards are targeted at the mainstream market and competitively priced against Nvidia and AMD offerings. The Arc B580 will be available starting December 13 for $249, while the Arc B570 is slated to hit store shelves on January 16 for $219.
With Xe2, Intel is touting a 70 percent performance improvement per core and a 50 percent boost in performance per watt compared to its Alchemist predecessor. While part of this uplift stems from TSMC's advanced N5 process node, much of it results from significant architectural enhancements and fixes.
Intel confirms Xe3 graphics hardware is finalized, Xe4 in the works
