The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is very likely the best chipset in the business right now, and that's thanks to a number of factors. It has an incredibly powerful GPU, strong computational capabilities, and it'll be the backbone of many high-tier devices released in 2023. There's no question that it's a better SoC than the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, but by how much?
As it turns out, it's a fairly substantial improvement. There are many reasons why that may be (even the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 managed to severely outclass the original Snapdragon 8 Gen 1), and it seems to boil down to efficiency. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 can do a lot more with the power it draws, whereas the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 always struggled. Couple that with power limitations instituted by OEMs to tame the 8 Gen 1 because otherwise, they ended up with boiling hot devices, and you had a chipset that felt like it was underperforming for some people.
So, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 leapfrogs over the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 in many different ways, but the reasons for that are atypical of normal year-on-year improvements. Such large improvements aren't sustainable, and the leap from the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, the chipset that the 8 Gen 1 basically should have been, to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 will be a lot smaller.
About this comparison: We compared the OnePlus 11 to the OnePlus 10 Pro. Both devices were factory reset, no Google accounts were linked, and Wi-Fi was only enabled to install update packages for benchmarks that required it. Benchmarking applications were installed via adb, and all tests were run on airplane mode with device batteries above 50%. Both devices had OnePlus' performance mode enabled to remove the artificial limit on the clock speed of these chipsets.
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs Snapdragon 8 Gen 1: Specifications
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Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 |
Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 |
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CPU |
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GPU |
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Display |
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AI |
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Memory |
LPDDR5X @ 4200MHz, 16GB |
LPDDR5 @ 3200MHz, 16GB |
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ISP |
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Modem |
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Charging |
Qualcomm Quick Charge 5 |
Qualcomm Quick Charge 5 |
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Connectivity |
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Manufacturing Process |
4nm TSMC |
4nm Samsung Foundry |
Fundamental differences
Given that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is an iteration above the last generation, the design differences are minimal. The primary core is upgraded from a Cortex-X2-based design to a Cortex-X3-based one. Interestingly, Qualcomm has moved from having three performance cores to four, increasing the computational power significantly.
As a result, Qualcomm does remove one efficiency core, which worried me that it may have an impact on the overall efficiency of the smartphone. As you'll see later on, though, it doesn't seem to. Performance is still great, power consumption is well within a normal range, and the only question mark concerns the inclusion of two A710 cores rather than four A715 cores.
With the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, we saw massive improvements in both performance and efficiency in a way we would only typically see with a year-on-year improvement. Comparing the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 widens that gap in ways that would not be expected of a typical generational improvement. It's genuinely incredible to think of the computational gains one may get upgrading from something like the OnePlus 10 Pro to the OnePlus 11.
Benchmarks overview
- GeekBench: A CPU-centric test that uses several computational workloads, including encryption, compression (text and images), rendering, physics simulations, computer vision, ray tracing, speech recognition, and convolutional neural network inference on images. The score breakdown gives specific metrics. The final score is weighted according to the designer’s considerations, placing a large emphasis on integer performance (65%), then float performance (30%), and finally, cryptography (5%).
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GFXBench: Aims to simulate video game graphics rendering using the latest APIs. Lots of onscreen effects and high-quality textures. Newer tests use Vulkan, while legacy tests use OpenGL ES 3.1. The outputs are frames during the test and frames per second (the other number divided by the test length, essentially) instead of a weighted score.
- Aztec Ruins: These tests are the most computationally heavy ones offered by GFXBench. Currently, top mobile chipsets cannot sustain 30 frames per second. Specifically, the test offers really high polygon count geometry, hardware tessellation, high-resolution textures, global illumination and plenty of shadow mapping, copious particle effects, as well as bloom and depth of field effects. Most of these techniques will stress the shader compute capabilities of the processor.
- Manhattan ES 3.0/3.1: This test remains relevant given that modern games have already arrived at their proposed graphical fidelity and implement the same kinds of techniques. It features complex geometry employing multiple render targets, reflections (cubic maps), mesh rendering, many deferred lighting sources, along with bloom and depth of field in a post-processing pass.
- CPU Throttling Test: This app repeats a simple multithreaded test in C for as short as 15 minutes, though we ran it for 30 minutes. The app charts the score over time so you can see when the phone starts throttling. The score is measured in GIPS — or billion operations per second.
- Burnout Benchmark: Loads different SoC components with heavy workloads to analyze their power consumption, thermal throttling, and their maximum performance. It uses Android’s BatteryManager API to calculate the watts being used during testing, which can be used to understand the battery drain on a smartphone.
Computational workload
These tests were conducted using Geekbench 5 and not Geekbench 6, though we will be transitioning to using Geekbench 6 in future comparisons.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 has some pretty big gains over the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 in this test, particularly regarding multithreaded workloads. Single-core improvements are noted, though there's "only" a 12.6% improvement. In contrast, multithreaded improvements amount to a 41.7% increase, which is fairly substantial. Most processing on your smartphone is multithreaded, so these improvements are notable.
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1: Power efficiency
Burnout Benchmark allows us to easily measure the power consumed by a chipset in a smartphone. The following tests are run on different components of the SoC as part of the Burnout Benchmark.
- GPU: Parallel vision-based computations using OpenCL
- CPU: Multi-threaded computations largely involving Arm Neon instructions
- NPU: AI models with typical machine learning ops
First and foremost, here are the power metrics that we collected.
As you can see from the above graphs, these chipsets consume a similar amount of power when pushed to their extremes. 14W of drainage is a lot, but our phones basically never reach that aside from when we really push them intentionally. Gaming may bring it close, but even games have moments where the action dulls and is less intense.
However, that's only one side of the coin. While they consume similar amounts of power when pushed to extremes, the actual performance you get out of these two chips wildly differs.
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Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 |
Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 |
Percentage change (from 8 Gen 1 to 8 Gen 2) |
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CPU FPS (peak) |
19.22 |
13.03 |
47% increase |
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GPU FPS (peak) |
27.47 |
15.34 |
79% increase |
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Wattage (peak) |
13.67W |
13.29W |
2.9% decrease |
The improvements shown above are only at peak performance, which means that the actual difference isn't as severe. You can see from the graphs above that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2's GPU starts a little bit higher but throttles a bit and then retains its performance, whereas the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 does not. Peak performance difference may be higher as it shows the overall capability of the chipset, even if it's only for a few seconds before it throttles down.
These gains are fairly ludicrous for a year-on-year improvement, but the reason for it is because of the inefficiency of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. If we were to compare the 8 Gen 2 to the 8 Plus Gen 1 (and we will), we would find that the gap is much closer. The 8 Gen 1, with the same amount of power draw, couldn't achieve anywhere near the same level of performance of the 8 Plus Gen 1. The above figures are also calculated at peak values.
It's also important to note that there may be software controls at play here, too. We use two devices from the same OEM as it's more likely to show the relativity of a chipset's improvement, and that's because an OEM is most likely to carry the same frequency scaling philosophy across multiple devices. OnePlus may have limited the 8 Gen 1's performance more than others, which would also skew the results.
Having said that, the performance improvements at the same wattage still point to a major jump from the 8 Gen 1 to the 8 Gen 2, and an impressive one at that.
Graphics
GFXBench is an application that can test the graphical capabilities of a smartphone's GPU through several different tests. We ran five tests here, with the most computationally taxing being the 1440p Aztec tests. We're seeing anywhere from a 13% improvement to a 43% improvement when testing the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, which is lower than the 79% improvement but still fairly substantial.
The reason for this discrepancy likely comes down to the testing methods used and the difference between peak performance and sustained performance. The peak performance sustained by the GPU is lower in the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 than its peak performance, though admittedly not by much. The Vulkan-based workloads shown above perform better, such as the Aztec tests.
CPU Throttling Test
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 retains its performance a lot better over time, retaining a much higher sustained performance over time and a higher peak. Its performance is held despite the phone's increased heat, which is a good sign in contrast to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1.
In other words, you can expect pretty decently sustained performance over time with Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 devices.
The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is a perfect iteration
The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is a perfect step forward for the flagship Snapdragon SoC series and yet another great chipset after the mess that was the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is a monumental improvement over the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, and the reason for that is mainly power efficiency.
Around this time last year, we were starting to read about companies like Samsung getting delisted from Geekbench thanks to their inconsistency in how they imposed limitations on the 8 Gen 1. OnePlus had limited the performance of the OnePlus 10 Pro out of the box, and OPPO had done the same. Companies that didn't impose limitations like those ended up with phones that were capable of potentially hurting their users, and it was a pretty bad time for smartphone chipsets overall.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is a perfect iteration in that it improves on the things that matter most while also not really taking a step back. All improvements were retained while also improving a step further, which is all you can ask for from the next generation of a product. We're looking forward to more devices launching with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset and are hopeful that Qualcomm keeps its streak going for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3.