Qualcomm tends to release a new version of its flagship mobile chipset towards the end of each year.
Assuming the US company continues with that theme, you can expect one before the end of 2024. The Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 is good, but designed for slightly less powerful phones.
So, what will the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 bring to the table? Here’s everything we know so far, including some leaked specs and rumoured first devices
When will the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 launch?
Qualcomm tends to launch a new flagship chipset every year, so the 8 Gen 4 is highly likely to arrive before the end of 2024.
As for a more specific date, leaker Digital Chat Station posted on Chinese social media site Weibo that it’s scheduled for mass production in September 2024.
That’d be earlier than in recent years, though Qualcomm does seem to have adopted a rough 11-month release cycle:
- Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 – December 2021
- Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 – November 2022
- Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 – October 2023
If the September launch month is true, this would be earliest in a calendar year that the Snapdragon Summit has taken place – assuming Qualcomm continues with its Hawaii launch events.
Of course, it’ll take a little while for phones powered by the new chipset to actually be available. Expect to see some high-profile launches in the 1-2 months following the announcement, though Samsung’s Galaxy S25 series flagships are likely to be the first big hitters.
Which phones will use the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4?
Of course, no phones have been confirmed to use Snapdragon 8 Gen 4. But the current 8 Gen 3 phones offer plenty of clues.
The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (plus S24 and S24+ outside Europe), Asus ROG Phone 8 Pro and OnePlus 12 were among the early adopters, so it’s likely that the next generations will shift to the newer Qualcomm chip.
However, pretty much all flagship smartphones not made by Apple or Google could be eligible. Look out for the successors to the Xiaomi 14, Honor Magic 6 series, Motorola Razr 50 Ultra, Oppo Find X7 UItra and Asus Zenfone 11 Ultra, though that’s by no means an exhaustive list.
The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6 and Z Fold 6 will probably launch too early, while the OnePlus Open 2 will depend on how long the company wants to leave between generations.
As for the early adopters, leaker Yogesh Brar thinks Xiaomi is in pole position:
However, while the Xiaomi 15 and 15 Pro are likely to launch right around the time of the 8 Gen 4 launch in China, they probably won’t come to Europe until early 2025.
It may be a similar story for the OnePlus 13, while the iQOO is unlikely to make it to Europe.
What will the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 specs and features be?
We’re not entirely sure about what to anticipate in the 8 Gen 4 chipset, but with a couple of leaks, we believe we have a pretty good understanding of a few key aspects.
TSMC’s 3nm process
Last year, only Apple released a family of 3nm chipsets using TSMC’s latest 3nm ‘N3B’ node.
Unfortunately, due to cost reasons, companies like Qualcomm and MediaTek had to wait another year to use the ‘N3E’ process, another version of the earlier 3nm tech. However, 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 (tweet since deleted) and Weibo leaker Digital Chat Station, Qualcomm will once again rely solely on TSMC for making the 3nm-based ‘Sun’ chipset this year.
Moving to TSMC’s second-generation 3nm process should let Qualcomm keep performance high while using less power. It might also boost power limits a bit for better multi-core performance, but not too much.
Just like on the Galaxy S24 series, it looks like there’ll be another overclocked ‘for Galaxy’ version of the chipset exclusively for Samsung phones.
Oryon/Phoenix CPU cores
A better manufacturing process isn’t the only thing that affects a chip’s performance and power use. The custom CPU designs also play a big role.
According to Digital Chat Station on Weibo, Qualcomm will probably ditch the current ARM designs for its own called Oryon or Phoenix cores. These will have a different setup from the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, possibly with no efficiency cores at all.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 will likely have a ‘2 + 6’ CPU layout instead of the ‘1 + 3 + 4’ in the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. This means all cores will be performance cores, which could result in a nice boost to multi-core performance.
While this may lead to greater power demands, this should be offset by a move to the 3nm node, and so the chip should be more power efficient overall.
Qualcomm is also rumoured to be testing the new chip at 4.00GHz, much faster than the 8 Gen 3.
This should boost both single-core and multi-threaded performance. Early benchmarks show it performing significantly better than the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 and even competing with Apple’s M3 chip:
New Adreno GPU
Rumours suggest Qualcomm will introduce the Adreno 830 GPU in the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4. We don’t have detailed specs yet, but X leaker Revegnus suggests it could be faster than Apple’s top M2 GPU in some tests.
This makes us curious about its graphics performance, especially after seeing the 8 Gen 3 outperforming Apple’s M2 in one benchmark.
In a multi-core test, Chinese tech site TechNews reports that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4 achieves over 10,000 points on Geekbench 6, while the Adreno 830 GPU maintains similar power consumption to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 but delivers significant performance improvements. It’s speculated that the entire chipset consumes only 8W of power.
But there’s fierce competition coming, with MediaTek preparing its Dimensity 9400 and Apple expected to release the A18 and A18 Pro chips for the upcoming iPhone 16 range. It’s looks set to be an exciting battle of 3nm smartphone chips in 2024.
If you need to buy a phone right now, take a look at our current picks of the best smartphones, along with the best upcoming phones in 2024. There’s a small chance that some of the latter will be powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4.
Author: Artur Tomala, Mobile Writer, Tech Advisor
Artur is a Mobile Writer at Tech Advisor, where he covers a range of smartphone, tablet and smartwatch-related topics. He has been working in the tech industry since 2021, including time spent leading a team focused on mobile news, reviews and product rankings. As an ambassador for the productivity app Notion, he runs training workshops and creates advanced templates to help people stay organised and productive.