Pixel 6 might be powered by a Google-designed ‘GS101’ processor

Google’s next Pixel flagship will reportedly come with a Google-designed GS101 “Whitechapel” system on a chip. 

9to5Google has claimed Google is developing two phones with an Arm-based “GS101” processor. One of the phones will likely be the Pixel 6, but both handsets will follow last year’s Pixel 5 and a Pixel 4A 5G. Keep in mind rumors of a Google SoC have been around for over a year, as Axios first reported Google was considering in-house chips for its Pixel and Chromebook devices.

XDA has reported that Google’s GS101 chip will feature a “three cluster setup with a TPU (Tensor Processing Unit)” for machine learning applications. Axios also claimed last year Google plans to ready its chip for Google’s ML technology.

Google’s SoC might also sport an integrated security chip, similar to the Titan M chip that Google introduced a couple years back.

The GS101 chip for the 2021 Pixel lineup is thought to be the first silicon from Google’s Whitechapel project. 9to5Google said it found references to a “Slider” codename, too, which it said points to Samsung’s Exynos SoCs used on Galaxy smartphone devices outside the US. That has us wondering if Samsung is involved with manufacturing – something Axios also reported on last year.

It’ll be interesting to see if the GS101 chip comes to fruition and whether it improves speed, performance, and battery life on Android and the Pixel lineup. Either way, we suspect it’ll take a few generations for Google to perfect its chips.