Nvidia and MediaTek have been rumored to be developing a new APU, and now it looks to shake up the gaming laptop market thanks to a recent report teasing its performance.
According to Taiwanese outlet UDN, Nvidia and MediaTek's joint development of its rumored APU (integrating CPU and GPU chips) for gaming laptops will deliver the same performance of an RTX 4070-equipped laptop, but with far better energy efficiency.
The rumor suggests the Nvidia APU will only use 65W power to match the performance of a 120W RTX 4070 gaming laptop, with the Arm-based chip tipped to incorporate a Blackwell-based GPU — what we've seen in the latest RTX 50-series graphics cards.
There's no word on what GPU it will be based on, with previous claims indicating it would use a smaller GB10 Blackwell chip for laptops. However, there's reason to believe it could use a GB206 model, similar to the RTX 5060 Ti or RTX 5060.
As per the report, Dell's gaming brand Alienware will be among the first to launch new gaming laptops featuring the APU. That means we could see fresh Alienware notebooks that are slimmer and offer better battery life, if rumors about Nvidia and MediaTek's chip are accurate.
The new APU is expected to launch in late 2025 or early 2026, which suggests it could be announced during CES 2026. Originally, the chip was tipped for a reveal during Computex 2025, but now it appears we'll get a closer look further down the line.
Moreover, another rumor from Moore's Law is Dead (via Notebookcheck) revealed Nvidia's APU for gaming laptops, with this leak suggesting the chip would offer a TDP (Thermal Design Power) of 80W to 120W. However, it also points to a late 2025/early 2026 release.
The rise of slimmer, more powerful gaming laptops
Nvidia and MediaTek's Arm-based chip already looks set to bolster ultraportable gaming laptops (and possibly PC gaming handhelds) with better power efficiency, which hopefully translates to greater battery life in gaming notebooks.
We've seen Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Series offers major battery and performance boosts, and even how a Snapdragon X Elite-powered laptop can play games — including GTA V.
With Nvidia's own chip sporting its GPU tech, however, gaming on APUs could see major performance gains. It already looks to have some competition, with AMD Strix Halo APU delivering close to RTX 4060 desktop GPU power in benchmarks and Qualcomm expected to deliver its next-gen Snapdragon X2 Series chips later this year.
For now, we'll have to wait and see how Nvidia's chip measures up if it ends up launching later this year. In the meantime, check out what the AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme delivers in our hands-on with the MSI Claw A8.
More from Tom's Guide
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