Qualcomm announces Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
At the Qualcomm Summit in Hawaii, the company unveiled its latest and most powerful smartphone chip. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is expected to arrive in flagship models in the first quarter of 2023, offering more processing power and better energy efficiency. The phones that are expected to receive the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 are the Xiaomi 13 series, Oppo Find X6 series, Motorola X40, OnePlus 11, Vivo X90 Pro+ and iQOO 11 series.
Qualcomm announced that 8 Gen 2 will support 200 MP cameras, and is already working with Samsung on the new ISOCELL HP3, a 200 MP image sensor optimized for this chip. That’s impressive, but not as impressive as Mediatek’s Dimensity 9200, which is said to support cameras up to 320 MP on a sensor. This chip is manufactured in a 4nm process, and it should ensure that new phones are more energy efficient and have a better AI performance.
Here is the list of what has been improved with 8 Gen 2 and what new standards it is bringing:
- 35% faster CPU (40% more efficient)
- 25% faster GPU (45% more efficient)
- 4.35x faster AI performance
- INT4 precision support (60% better performance/watt)
- Wi-Fi 7 (10 Gbps peak speed)
- AI-powered Always-Sensing Camera
- Hardware-Accelerated Ray Tracing
Another interesting tidbit from the Summit is the announcement of the Snapdragon W5. This is Qualcomm’s new 4nm wearable platform and one of the first watches to get it is the Oppo Watch 3 Pro. Apparently, this chipset should give new Android (or WearOS)-powered wearables better performance and battery life. I am not a big fan of WearOS watches since I don’t like a watch that needs charging every day, but this chip might at least provide 4 days of moderate usage (actually that is what Oppo is promising although you can divide that number by 2).
Anyways, the chances of seeing this processor in new Nokia devices are slim, but hey, you never know, especially now that the top management has changed. Anything is possible :).
Read more about Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 here.
