According to the latest information shared by long-time Intel leaker Jaykihn, Intel's upcoming Xeon 7 "Diamond Rapids" will feature a flagship SKU with up to 256 P-Cores. This contradicts previous reports suggesting that Intel's flagship Xeon 7 SKU would be limited to 192 P-Cores and 192 threads, as this generation does not include Hyper-Threading. From Intel's VLSI Symposium 2026 presentation, we learned that "Diamond Rapids" includes four Compute tiles, also known as "core building blocks" (CBBs), each built on the Intel 18A-P foundry node. Each Compute tile contains a CPU complex with 48 "Panther Cove" P-Cores and an L3 cache localized to the tile. However, a 256-core design implies CBBs with 64 cores each and possibly a larger L3 cache.

Using Intel's latest 18A-P node, the "Diamond Rapids" CBBs are expected to achieve a 9% increase in performance at the same power level compared to the standard 18A node, or an 18% power reduction at the same performance level. Since Intel aims for maximum performance, we can expect these improvements to enhance performance further or to optimize power consumption with the additional cores. Earlier claims suggested a 500 W TDP design for 192 P-Core version, featuring 16 DDR5 memory channels and running on a new LGA-9324 socket on the "Oak Stream" platform. However, a 256-core design could go much higher, and cooling manufacturers have indicated 800+ W TDP designs for this socket.For comparison, AMD's Zen 6 "Venice" platform offers up to 256 Zen 6c dense cores and 512 threads, which Intel will aim to compete against with its 256 P-Core SKU. However, AMD's platform is already available, while the Xeon 7 series of "Diamond Rapids" designs will only be released next year. Intel plans to reintroduce a Hyper-Threading Xeon family in 2028 with the arrival of Xeon 8 "Coral Rapids."