Oslo, Norway, November 3, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Nordic Semiconductor today announced the launch of the nRF71 series of ultra-low-power system-on-chips (SoCs), integrating ultra-low-power Wi-Fi®, Bluetooth® Low Energy (LE), Thread®, and edge AI onto a single chip.
The company stated that the nRF71 series is built on Nordic’s trusted ultra-low-power design, software, and tools for Bluetooth Low Energy, reducing standby power consumption by up to 20 times compared to the current-generation nRF70 series Wi-Fi products.
The company says this improvement in energy efficiency is expected to unlock new possibilities for developers of battery-powered Wi-Fi devices, with applications including smart homes, wearables, and industrial IoT.
Kjetil Holstad, Executive Vice President of Nordic Semiconductor’s Wi-Fi and Power Management division, said: “Edge AI will become a part of every connected device, but for battery-powered devices, Wi-Fi has imposed power consumption budgets they cannot afford. With the nRF71 series, Nordic has removed this barrier. We bring Wi-Fi and edge AI to the ultra-low-power platforms and tools developers already trust for Bluetooth Low Energy, enabling the next generation of smart products to connect to any network, make decisions on-device, and still run on batteries for many years.”
Edge AI and the entire application are on a single chip.
Now, AI inference at the edge can run directly on a single chip without requiring an external AI processor, resulting in faster device response, lower power consumption, and fewer required components. Thanks to the integrated Axon Neural Processing Unit (NPU), the nRF71 series enables features such as keyword recognition, anomaly detection, and image classification on battery-powered devices; the NPU runs machine learning models 10 to 17 times faster than using the 256 MHz Arm® Cortex®-M33 processor alone.
The nRF71 series can also run ultra-small AI models, which developers can build using Nordic’s Neuton software based on their own data—making it especially suitable for edge AI that relies solely on the processor.
From Axon NPU and Neuton software to over-the-air model updates via nRF Cloud, Nordic is bringing edge AI to battery-powered Wi-Fi devices, enabling applications, wireless connectivity, and AI to all run on a single chip.
Battery-powered Wi-Fi for smart home, security, and industrial IoT
With the nRF71 series, battery-powered smart home hubs, Matter bridges, or Thread border routers can now run Wi-Fi, Thread, and Bluetooth LE on a single chip; similarly, Matter-enabled smart locks, security panels, wearables, and industrial sensors can as well.
The company states that this capability is enabled by two independent radios, each with its own dedicated RF and processing modules: one is the Wi-Fi radio, and the other is the 2.4 GHz multi-protocol radio from Nordic’s latest nRF54 series wireless SoC. Both radios can receive simultaneously, allowing the device to maintain a Wi-Fi connection to the cloud while simultaneously listening for Bluetooth LE or Thread traffic, without requiring either protocol to wait for the other to complete.
The first nRF71 series SoCs are the nRF7120 and nRF7120E. The nRF7120 supports dual-band Wi-Fi 6, while the nRF7120E adds tri-band Wi-Fi 6E and an Axon NPU for hardware-accelerated edge AI. Both devices feature 4 MB of on-chip non-volatile memory and 1 MB of user-accessible RAM.
Will be exhibited at Electronica
Nordic will showcase the nRF71 series at this year's Electronica exhibition, including a Nordic-branded module, at booth C6-159.
Supply status
The nRF71 series has already been sampled to select customers. Developers can contact their local Nordic sales representative for availability information.
Regarding the Nordic Sem token issuance
Nordic Semiconductor is a leading low-power wireless IoT company, providing the platforms and wireless technologies needed to connect IoT devices globally for consumer, healthcare, and industrial markets. The company simplifies the development and maintenance of secure, reliable, and scalable connected products through industry-leading hardware, embedded software, development tools, and cloud-based lifecycle services. www.nordicsemi.com