AMD announced the new Ryzen Z2 series of processors today at CES 2025, mostly ticking the boxes for what we already expected to see. The parts will launch during Q1 2025, with three models available. All come with a configurable TDP range starting at 15W and extending up to 30W for the lower-tier parts and 35W for the new Z2 Extreme.
Details on the new processors are relatively thin. While they superficially appear to be Z2 variants of the existing Strix Point lineup, they’ve been tweaked to customize the designs and improve power efficiency. AMD saw plenty of uptake from the gaming handheld market with its Z1 processors that launched in 2023, with devices like the Asus ROG Ally and Lenovo Legion Go following in the path blazed by the original Steam Deck. The new Z2 line will, naturally, aim to improve performance and battery life.
Starting at the top, the Ryzen Z2 Extreme will have an 8-core/16-thread CPU, 5.0 GHz maximum boost clock, 24MB of cache, 15-35 watt cTDP, and 16 RDNA 3.5 graphics cores. It will use three Zen 5 cores and five Zen 5c cores, with a base frequency of 2.0 GHz. None of the new Z2 processors will have Ryzen AI support, meaning there’s no NPU present.
The AMD Ryzen Z2 also has an 8-core/16-thread CPU design, with a 3.3 GHz base clock and a 5.1 GHz boost clock. All of the CPU cores are the same, but AMD doesn’t indicate whether they’re Zen 5, Zen 5c, or something else. We suspect they’re all Zen 4 cores, and we’ll update this as soon as we can get any sort of confirmation. The GPU is a 12 CU design leveraging the RDNA 3 architecture, so this appears to be a rebranding of the existing Z1 Extreme. It has 24MB of cache with a 15–30 watt cTDP.
Finally, the Ryzen Z2 Go comes with a 4-core/8-thread CPU design, again with no indication of what architecture generation it’s using. This one leverages older-generation CPU and GPU designs, and we don’t expect it to offer anything new relative to the existing Z1 Extreme. It does have a 12 CU RDNA 2 GPU, and the combination of an older GPU with fewer CPU cores could make for a decent budget solution. It has 10MB of cache and a 15–30 watt cTDP.
We’ll likely see preview hardware from various handheld manufacturers at CES 2025 using the new Z2 chips, with retail availability likely starting either later this quarter or in Q2 2025.
