NPU (chip built for AI math)
Japanese NPU（AI計算に特化したチップ）
An NPU is a chip inside a computer or phone built only for the math that AI models use. It does that work with less power than a CPU or GPU, which is what lets AI run on the device without the internet.
A computer has a CPU that handles all kinds of work and a GPU that handles pictures and video. The NPU is a third chip that handles only AI math. It is built to do, many at a time, the big multiplications and additions an AI model repeats, so it finishes the same job with less power than a CPU or GPU. It is like putting a rice cooker that only cooks rice next to the chef who cooks everything. Microsoft calls a Windows 11 computer with an NPU that does more than 40 trillion operations a second (40 TOPS) a Copilot+ PC.
Watch out Having an NPU does not make every AI faster. A program has to be written to use the NPU, and not many apps are yet. Local AI tools such as Ollama run without an NPU, so when you buy a computer, look first at whether the software you want supports it and how much memory it has, rather than at the NPU number. On a Windows computer, the Performance tab of Task Manager shows whether you have an NPU.
Source: Microsoft Learn, “Copilot+ PCs developer guide” · Microsoft Support, “All about neural processing units (NPUs)” · Samsung Semiconductor, “NPU (Neural Processing Units)” (checked 2026-10-28)