Qualcomm might have solely launched its newest flagship Android chipset in October, however consideration has rapidly shifted to the subsequent era.
Nearly as good because the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 is, we’ve excessive hopes for its successor, which we assume shall be often called the Snapdragon 8 Gen.
And there are already loads of rumoured upgrades, together with the transfer to TSMC’s 3nm course of and model new efficiency cores.
Right here’s every part it is advisable to know.
When will the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 launch?
Qualcomm tends to launch a brand new flagship chipset yearly, so the 8 Gen 4 is extremely more likely to arrive earlier than the top of 2024.
As for a extra particular date, leaker Digital Chat Station posted on Chinese language social media web site Weibo that it’s scheduled for mass manufacturing in September 2024.
That’d be sooner than lately, although Qualcomm does appear to have adopted a tough 11-month launch cycle:
If the September launch month is true, this is able to be earliest in a calendar yr that the Snapdragon Summit has taken place – assuming Qualcomm continues with its Hawaii launch occasions.
In fact, it’ll take a short while for telephones powered by the brand new chipset to truly be out there. Count on to see some high-profile launches within the 1-2 months following the announcement, although Samsung’s Galaxy S25 sequence flagships are more likely to be the primary huge hitters.
Which telephones will use the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4?
In fact, no telephones have been confirmed to make use of Snapdragon 8 Gen 4. However the present 8 Gen 3 telephones supply loads of clues.
The Samsung Galaxy S24 Extremely (plus S24 and S24+ exterior Europe), Asus ROG Cellphone 8 Professional and OnePlus 12 have been among the many early adopters, so it’s possible that the subsequent generations will shift to the newer Qualcomm chip.
Nevertheless, just about all flagship smartphones not made by Apple or Google could possibly be eligible. Look out for the successors to the Xiaomi 14, Honor Magic 6 sequence, Motorola Razr 50 Extremely, Oppo Discover X7 UItra and Asus Zenfone 11, although that’s in no way an exhaustive listing.
The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6 and Z Fold 6 will most likely launch too early, whereas the OnePlus Open 2 will rely upon how lengthy the corporate needs to depart between generations.
What is going to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 specs and options be?
We’re not fully certain about what to anticipate within the 8 Gen 4 chipset, however with a few leaks, we imagine we’ve a fairly good understanding of some key elements.
TSMC’s 3nm course of
Final yr, solely Apple launched a household of 3nm chipsets utilizing TSMC’s newest 3nm ‘N3B’ node.
Sadly, attributable to value causes, corporations like Qualcomm and MediaTek needed to wait one other yr to make use of the ‘N3E’ course of, one other model of the sooner 3nm tech. Nevertheless, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 and Dimensity 9300 were still powerful despite being made on TSMC’s N4P 4nm tech.
However, according to X leaker Revegnus and Weibo leaker Digital Chat Station, Qualcomm will as soon as once more rely solely on TSMC for making the 3nm-based ‘Solar’ chipset this yr.
Transferring to TSMC’s second-generation 3nm course of ought to let Qualcomm hold efficiency excessive whereas utilizing much less energy. It may also enhance energy limits a bit for higher multi-core efficiency, however not an excessive amount of.
Similar to on the Galaxy S24 sequence, it seems like there’ll be one other overclocked ‘for Galaxy’ model of the chipset completely for Samsung telephones.
Oryon/Phoenix CPU cores
A greater manufacturing course of isn’t the one factor that impacts a chip’s efficiency and energy use. The customized CPU designs additionally play a giant position.
Based on Digital Chat Station on Weibo, Qualcomm will most likely ditch the present ARM designs for its personal known as Oryon or Phoenix cores. These can have a special setup from the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, presumably with no effectivity cores in any respect.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 will possible have a ‘2 + 6’ CPU format as an alternative of the ‘1 + 3 + 4’ within the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. This implies all cores shall be efficiency cores, which might end in a pleasant enhance to multi-core efficiency.
Whereas this may occasionally result in larger energy calls for, this must be offset by a transfer to the 3nm node, and so the chip must be extra energy environment friendly general.
Qualcomm can also be rumoured to be testing the brand new chip at 4.00GHz, a lot quicker than the 8 Gen 3.
This could enhance each single-core and multi-threaded efficiency. Early benchmarks show it performing considerably higher than the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 and even competing with Apple’s M3 chip:
New Adreno GPU
Rumours counsel Qualcomm will introduce the Adreno 830 GPU within the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4. We don’t have detailed specs but, however X leaker Revegnus suggests it could possibly be quicker than Apple’s high M2 GPU in some checks.
This makes us interested by its graphics efficiency, particularly after seeing the 8 Gen 3 outperforming Apple’s M2 in a single benchmark.
In a multi-core check, Chinese language tech web site TechNews experiences that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 achieves over 10,000 factors on Geekbench 6, whereas the Adreno 830 GPU maintains comparable energy consumption to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 however delivers vital efficiency enhancements. It’s speculated that your entire chipset consumes solely 8W of energy.
However there’s fierce competitors coming, with MediaTek getting ready its Dimensity 9400 and Apple anticipated to launch the A18 and A18 Professional chips for the upcoming iPhone 16 vary. It’s seems set to be an thrilling battle of 3nm smartphone chips in 2024.
If it is advisable to purchase a cellphone proper now, check out our present picks of the greatest smartphones, together with the greatest upcoming telephones in 2024. There’s a small probability that a few of the latter shall be powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4.
