Cost per wafer is the total manufacturing cost to process one wafer through all fabrication steps. It's the fundamental unit economics metric for semiconductor manufacturing.

Typical Cost Per Wafer (300mm)

• Mature nodes (28nm+): $2,000-4,000 per wafer • Advanced nodes (7-10nm): $8,000-12,000 per wafer • Leading edge (3-5nm): $15,000-20,000+ per wafer • 2nm (projected): $25,000-30,000 per wafer

Cost Components

Materials (15-25%): Silicon wafers, chemicals, gases, slurries, photoresists, targets. Depreciation (30-40%): Equipment amortization—a single EUV scanner costs $350M and lasts ~10 years. Labor (10-15%): Engineers, technicians, operators (highly automated fabs need fewer people). Utilities (5-10%): Electricity (50-100MW per fab), ultra-pure water, cleanroom HVAC. Overhead (10-20%): Facility maintenance, IT, management, quality systems.

Why Cost Increases at Advanced Nodes

More process steps (500 at 28nm → 1000+ at 3nm). More EUV layers ($350M per scanner, 10-20+ EUV layers). More mask layers (60-80 masks, $5-10M per mask set). Lower yields during ramp (fewer good dies per wafer). Higher fab construction cost ($20B+ for a leading-edge fab).

Cost Per Die

What really matters is cost per good die = cost per wafer / (die per wafer × die yield). Even though advanced-node wafers cost more, the smaller die size and higher transistor density can reduce cost per transistor.