The Snapdragon 8 Elite processor is shaping up to be, in theory, a huge advancement for flagship Android smartphones. Qualcomm’s new smartphone chip features a custom CPU that features an impressive 4.32GHz clock speed, but the company now says it could have offered even higher performance.
Qualcomm previously said: Android permissions The company says it designed the chip with the best user experience in mind, and expects its benchmarks to outperform rival processors. But will the company ever release a flagship chipset with benchmarks that underperform compared to its competitors?
Android Authority’s C Scott Brown asked Shahin Farahani, Snapdragon 8 Elite project lead, the following questions:
It’s already happening today. You can also optimize for even higher benchmarks and sacrifice real-world use cases. So you can focus on thermal limits (sic) or benchmark higher. That’s why we’re choosing to put end-user experience first, rather than a few more benchmarks. So on some level that’s what’s happening right now.
In other words, Farahani suggests that while there is still room to further increase peak performance and clock speeds, Qualcomm has chosen to optimize for battery life and sustained performance. This is not surprising, as all smartphone chip manufacturers have to strike a delicate balance between peak performance, sustained performance, and battery life.
Nevertheless, Qualcomm has been offering high-clock versions of its flagship chips for the past few years, namely the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy and Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy chips. These overclocked chips were initially exclusive to Samsung until later released to other OEMs. So don’t be surprised if we see even faster Snapdragon 8 Elite chips in 2025.
Disclosure: C Scott Brown is Qualcomm’s guest at the Snapdragon Summit. Qualcomm had no influence over Android Authority’s editorial coverage.
