Nvidia Jetson Xavier NX: Ultra‑Compact AI Processor Matching Xavier Performance

Nvidia has introduced the Jetson Xavier NX, a board that packs the performance of the AGX Xavier into the compact 70 × 45 mm footprint of the Jetson Nano.

The Xavier NX delivers 14–21 TOPS in INT8 mode at 10–15 W, enabling simultaneous execution of multiple neural networks and real‑time processing of several high‑resolution camera streams.

Its core is a Volta GPU AI accelerator with 384 CUDA cores and 48 tensor cores, complemented by two NVIDIA Deep Learning Accelerators. The CPU is a 6‑core NVIDIA Carmel ARM 64‑bit processor.

The Xavier NX sits between the powerful AGX Xavier (up to 32 TOPS) and the modest Nano (0.5 TFLOPS FP16). Compared to the TX2, it is smaller yet delivers up to 15× higher performance within the same 10–15 W envelope.

Nvidia’s Jetson Xavier NX board is smaller than a credit card and provides 1.4 TOPS/W (Image: Nvidia)

"Jetson Xavier NX fits a needed market space between TX2 and AGX Xavier," said Patrick Moorhead, president and principal analyst, Moor Insights and Strategy. "It’s ideal for devices with the need for many sensors, even a battery‑powered, highest‑performance drone. The biggest benefit is a massive amount of ML inference performance with a mature toolchain… There’s nothing out there like it with that much ML performance at that power envelope."

"This is the world’s smallest AI supercomputer," said Rob Csongor, VP of Autonomous Machines at Nvidia. "It’s Xavier‑level performance in a Nano size."

The board targets embedded and robotics applications that can operate on 10–15 W of power. Use cases include small commercial delivery robots and drones that process multiple camera streams, robotic arms with high‑resolution sensors for logistics and production, space‑constrained video‑analytics nodes, and handheld medical imaging devices.

"There are very important specific segments of the market that are defined by a need for increasing performance, in a box that does not increase in size," Csongor added. "The power budget also does not increase. And as a result, if you are not able to deliver a lot of performance within those constraints, then the applications are constrained. Xavier NX is perfect for these segments."

The Jetson Xavier NX, which is pin‑compatible with the Jetson Nano, will be available in March 2020.