Qualcomm announced Snapdragon 8 Elite – a 3nm processor for the Galaxy S25 and other next-generation flagships

Qualcomm today introduced the new Snapdragon 8 Elite mobile processor. Previously, it was known as Snapdragon 8 Gen 4. The chip is equipped with two large Oryon Prime processing cores operating at a frequency of up to 4.32 GHz, as well as six performance cores with a frequency of up to 3.53 GHz.

Image Source: Qualcomm

The Snapdragon 8 Elite processor is manufactured using a 3nm process technology. The chip received 24 MB of L2 cache memory, 12 MB for each core block. Qualcomm says single- and multi-threaded performance of the new chip is up to 45% higher than its predecessor. The energy efficiency of Snapdragon 8 Elite is up to 27% higher overall than its predecessor.

The Snapdragon 8 Elite also features an integrated Adreno 830 GPU, which is 40% faster in raster graphics processing and up to 35% faster in ray tracing than its predecessor GPU. The Adreno 830 GPU frequency is 1.1 GHz. It supports all modern graphics APIs and engines, including Unreal Engine, Nanite and Chaos Engine.

The Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 claims support for dual-channel LPDDR5X-5300 RAM, an integrated NPU with performance up to 45% higher than its predecessor, as well as a Snapdragon X80 modem with support for Wi-Fi 7 and 5G.

The use of Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 is expected in smartphones such as Realme GT7 Pro, Samsung Galaxy S25 and Xiaomi 15, as well as other flagships next year.