In the smartphone world, we tend to think that the pace of the industry is dictated by Apple, Samsung, and Google (which handles Android). But we can easily forget a fourth player: Qualcomm. The Californian company designs the famous Snapdragon chips that you find in entry-level to high-end devices. On Android, while they have competitors like MediaTek or Samsung Foundry, Qualcomm remains the player that releases the most powerful chip on the market each year, which gives it a bit of a conductor role for the pace of new products.
Indeed, this technological advance, coupled with the renewed confidence of many partners, gives Qualcomm a critical place in the high-end segment. While this is not where manufacturers make the bulk of their sales, it remains a critical segment for brand image where there is no room for error. As a result, every year, there's a race between smartphone manufacturers to be the first to announce that they will be equipped with Qualcomm's latest high-end chip.
The schedule has accelerated by three months in four years
Except that the conductor (Qualcomm) seems to be determined to play faster and faster. According to leaker Digital Chat Station, a reliable source, Qualcomm's next high-end chip, the Snapdragon 8 Elite 2, will be released as early as the end of September.
This would put it nearly a month ahead of last year's Snapdragon 8 Elite announcement, released in late October 2024, which was itself a month ahead of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, released in mid-November 2022, which was itself two weeks ahead of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. unveiled on December 1, 2021. You get the idea.
If the Snapdragon 8 Elite 2 does indeed arrive at the end of September, it should be followed by a cascade of announcements from manufacturers wanting to equip their latest flagships with it. As a result, in the space of four, the entire release schedule for high-end smartphones would have lost three full months.
However, this state of affairs should be qualified. Some very powerful players in the smartphone market can completely free themselves from the schedule established by Qualcomm. This is the case for no less than Apple, which has traditionally released its iPhones in September for years, or Samsung, which has been holding out for its Galaxy S at the beginning of the year, between January and February.
And concretely, what would this Snapdragon 8 Elite 2 bring?
According to GSM Arena, the Snapdragon 8 Elite would unleash 30% additional performance on the GPU part and 25% on the CPU part. This while the Snapdragon 8 Elite already reigned supreme in benchmarks of all kinds, particularly in gaming smartphones like the Asus ROG Phone 9 Pro that we tested end of 2024.
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