Intel is entering the GPU market

Known as the Intel Arc brand, the products will arrive on the market in 2022.

Intel has revealed that it is entering the graphics cards market, to become a direct competitor to AMD and Nvidia. The cards are set to be part of a new sub-brand of Intel known as Arc, which will offer hardware, software, and services, and will span multiple hardware generations.

The first set of cards are set to be based on a microarchitecture that has been codenamed Alchemist (formerly known as DG2), and are slated to offer "hardware-based ray tracing and artificial intelligence-driven super sampling, and offer full support for DirectX 12 Ultimate."

Intel also revealed that future generations of the hardware will be codenamed Battlemage, Celestial, and Druid.

"Today marks a key moment in the graphics journey we started just a few years ago," said Roger Chandler, Intel vice president and general manager of client graphics products and solutions. "The launch of the Intel Arc brand and the reveal of future hardware generations signifies Intel's deep and continued commitment to gamers and creators everywhere. We have teams doing incredible work to ensure we deliver first-class and frictionless experiences when these products are available early next year."

A video attached to the release also did show the cards playing Chivalry 2, Metro Exodus, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, and a few other games.

As for when the Arc cards will launch, the Alchemist generation is set to arrive in the first quarter of 2022, with more specifics set to be dished out later in 2021.