Snapdragon 8 Elite will be the chip that helps many Android phones "defeat" the mighty iPhone 16.
Qualcomm's flagship mobile chip is getting a new name - the Snapdragon 8 Elite. The chip not only brings cosmetic changes - it's built on a 3-nanometer process - but also a new CPU and promises to bring more neural processing capabilities to handle new AI features on the device.
Which phones will use the Snapdragon 8 Elite?
Qualcomm has listed nine phone makers committed to equipping the Snapdragon 8 Elite, and says those companies are "ready to launch Snapdragon 8 Elite-powered devices in the coming weeks."
Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite chip is here.
Notably, Samsung and OnePlus are among the companies that have committed to equipping the Snapdragon 8 Elite, along with Asus, Xiaomi, Honor, Oppo. The Snapdragon 8 Elite is expected to be available in Samsung's Galaxy S25 series as well as the OnePlus 13.
OnePlus 13 will launch in China on October 31. Similarly, Samsung will hold a Galaxy S25 launch event in January next year. It is likely that the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip will only be available on the international Galaxy S25 Ultra.
Additionally, some phones will feature the Snapdragon 8 Elite. Asus plans to launch the ROG Phone 9 with the new chip in November, while the Honor Magic 7 will also use Qualcomm's latest chip, launching on October 30.
Xiaomi's leadership appeared at the Snapdragon Summit in Hawaii to announce that the Xiaomi 15 series will be "the first smartphone powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip globally."
Snapdragon 8 Elite Performance
Like Apple's A18 silicon, the Snapdragon 8 Elite will be manufactured on a 3nm process, an improvement over the 4nm process used by the current Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. The smaller the process, the closer the transistors are to each other, improving both performance and power efficiency.
This chip will be on the Galaxy S25.
The Oryon CPU used in the Snapdragon 8 Elite introduces a completely new architecture with two main cores running at 4.3GHz and six performance cores, designed to handle intensive tasks while maximizing power efficiency. Qualcomm is removing the performance cores from this version of Oryon, continuing its trend of using fewer performance cores in its CPUs.
In terms of performance, Qualcomm says the chip will improve 45% in both single-core and multi-core tasks compared to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, with a 62% increase in web browsing speed. At the same time, CPU energy efficiency will improve 44% with the Oryon CPU.
Qualcomm has shared some benchmarks for the Snapdragon 8 Elite, which scored an average of 3,221 and 10,426 on Geekbench 6. This puts smartphones running the chip comfortably ahead of the 2,300 single-core and 7,249 multi-core scores of the Galaxy S24 Ultra running the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3.
The Snapdragon 8 Elite's single-core score will be on par with the iPhone 16 Pro Max's 3,386. But its multi-core score will beat the iPhone 16 Pro Max's score by about 26%.
Snapdragon 8 Elite AI
Every high-end phone these days has AI-powered features — especially if they can be processed on the device itself. The Snapdragon 8 Elite is trying to meet this need by integrating multimodal AI applications to power on-device experiences.
That requires a new architecture for the AI engine on Snapdragon silicon powered by the Oryon CPU. According to a Qualcomm executive, Oryon does the heavy lifting while other parts of the neural engine handle AI-specific tasks.
Illustration photo.
According to Qualcomm, the chip will help increase the speed of the neural processor by 45% compared to last year's version. Additionally, Qualcomm has added color to both the scaler and vector accelerators to handle the needs of AI.
It's worth noting that the Snapdragon 8 Elite will help power AI assistants on phones with larger files to process.
Apple is trying to catch up with companies like Google and Samsung when it comes to AI. The upcoming advancements in the Snapdragon 8 Elite will put Android smartphones ahead of the iPhone until next year.
Other improvements of Snapdragon 8 Elite
The new chip also features Qualcomm's Snapdragon X80 5G Modem-RF System, which improves connectivity and integrates Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and UWB to support proximity positioning. It also supports Wi-Fi 7 via Qualcomm's FastConnect 7900 Mobile Connectivity System.
Qualcomm's Snapdragon Summit continues through Wednesday (October 23), with the promise of more demos showcasing the capabilities of the Snapdragon 8 Elite. We'll have more information on the chip in future stories.
