Originally introduced as a project in progress in 2022, PCI Express 7.0 continues to evolve. Full release is expected in 2025 with version 0.3 of the specification in mid-2023 and current version 0.5.
But despite these improvements, the consumer market is still actively embracing PCIe 5.0, with PCIe 6.0 on the way. Each iteration of the PCIe standard doubles the bandwidth of its predecessor.
PCIe 7.0 is ready for an impressive 128 gigatransfers per second. Depending on the configuration, this could translate to 512GB/s with the x16 link or 32GB/s with the x1 link. As shown in the chart below, each new generation allows either a halving of the number of lanes for the same speed or a doubling of the speed on the same number of lanes
While PCIe 7.0 promises notable improvements, consumer hardware, such as the Nvidia RTX 4090 and AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX, are still primarily using PCIe 4.0 slots while PCIe 5.0 adoption continues, which is expected for integration with next-gen graphics cards. Notably, a PCIe 4.0 x16 link can only achieve 64GB/s transfer speed, while PCIe 7.0 can achieve the same in only 2 lanes.
However, widespread adoption of PCIe 7.0 for consumer products is still a long way off. It is expected to be deployed initially on servers, meeting the needs of applications that require high data speeds. The new PCI-SIG standard is used in a variety of areas, including 800G Ethernet, AI and machine learning devices, cloud servers, and even quantum computing.
The goals of PCIe 7.0 are great, aim to deliver 128 GT/s raw bit rate, achieve bi-directional throughput of up to 512 GB/s using x16 configuration, use PAM4 signal, optimize channel parameters, support latency low and high performance, Has reliability standards, increases power efficiency, and ensures compatibility with all previous generations of PCIe technology.
