low power DDR (SDRAM) (LPDDR)

Low Power DDR (LPDDR) are SDRAMs that use the DDR process, meet the specifications and functions of DDR SDRAMs, but require a much lower voltage, resulting in reduced power consumption.

LPDDR SDRAMs are used in mobile devices because of their lower power consumption. They are therefore also referred to as mDDR, which stands for mobile.

In terms of voltage ratings, LPDDR1 operates at a supply voltage of 1.8 V, as opposed to DDR1, which operates at 2.5 V. LPDDR3 only requires 1.2 V and LPDDR4 only 1.1 V. Since the performance increases in square with the voltage, every voltage reduction, no matter how small, has an immediate effect on the performance balance. In the various LPDDR versions, the clock frequency for the bus clock was increased from 200 MHz (LPDDR1), via 800 MHz (LPDDR3) to 1,600 MHz (LPDDR4). At the same time, the data transfer rate increased from 400 MT/s via 800 MT/s via 1,600 MT/s up to 3,200 MT/s (LPDDR4).

LPDDRs can be connected via bus widths of 16 bit, 32 bit and 64 bit.