As of what I've read in [1], nRF9160 uses ARM Cortex-M33. I'm not sure which qemu of the Zephyr OS is compatible with ARM Cortex-M33 the most ? qemu_cortex_m3 or none of them in the list of support boards of zephyr OS [2]?
[1] https://www.nordicsemi.com/Products/Low-power-cellular-IoT/nRF9160
[2] https://docs.zephyrproject.org/2.3.0/boards/arm/index.html