In plain words: Google kept the same basic chip design across five generations of its AI training machines, scaling up memory, speed, and reliability rather than redesigning each time. Over eight years this delivered a 3600x jump in supercomputer performance while cutting energy and carbon per calculation.
Abstract · Google's Training Supercomputers from TPU v2 to Ironwood: Architectural Stability, Scale, Resilience, Power Efficiency, and Sustainability Across Five Generations
This paper (to appear in the July/August 2026 issue of IEEE Micro magazine) summarizes five generations of Google s TPUs, from TPU v2 to Ironwood, highlighting their evolution as scalable, resilient, power-efficient, sustainable supercomputers for AI training. It details the TPU s stable architecture, which has surprisingly easily accommodated the rapidly changing deep neural network workloads, such as the rise of Transformers. Key advancements over eight years include 10x increase in HBM capacity and bandwidth per node, a 100x increase in peak node performance, and a 3600x increase in supercomputer performance. The paper also discusses the role of optical circuit switches, built-in self test, and hardware replay in enhancing resilience and how TPU's environmental impact is reduced with substantial improvements in performance per Watt and in carbon emissions per floating point operation. It concludes by identifying six features that may well characterize successful training accelerators of this decade.
Norman P. Jouppi, Sridhar Lakshmanamurthy, Cliff Young, David Patterson
arXiv:2606.15870 · cs.AR · submitted Jun 14, 2026
abstract · pdf