First sighting of Samsung Galaxy S24+ with Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 running Geekbench 6

2023-08-09

The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 launched with an unusual CPU configuration – 1 prime, 2+2 performance and 3 efficiency cores. A Geekbench 6.1.0 scorecard just surfaced and it shows that Qualcomm is dropping one efficiency core to add an extra performance core and that the performance cores will run at different speeds.

It has 1x prime core at 3.30GHz, then three performance cores at 3.15GHz, joined by two more running at a lower 2.96GHz and, finally, two efficiency cores at 2.27GHz. Here’s a comparison table:

	Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 (speculative)	Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
Prime	1x Cortex-X4 @ 3.30GHz	1x Cortex-X3 @ 3.2GHz*
Performance 1	3x Cortex-A7xx @ 3.15GHz	2x Cortex-A715 @ 2.8GHz
Performance 2	2x Cortex-A7xx @ 2.96GHz	2x Cortex-A710 @ 2.8GHz
Efficiency	2x Cortex-A5xx @ 2.27GHz	3x Cortex-A510 @ 2.0GHz
* 3.36GHz prime core on the "for Galaxy" and 8+ Gen 2 chips

Notice that while the performance cores on the 8 Gen 2 were different (A715 and A710), they ran at the same frequency. The 8 Gen 3 runs the two clusters at different frequencies, whether they feature different cores is not known yet. ARM has already unveiled the Cortex-X4, A720 and A520, so they are the most likely candidates for the Gen 3 chip (unless ARM comes out with new designs between now and October 24).

The 1+5+2 or rather 1+(3+2)+2 core configuration follows the setup that ARM had in mind when designing these cores. The X4 promises 15% higher performance on equal power or 25% higher efficiency at equal performance. The expectations were for the X4 to hit 3.4GHz, pretty much where the “for Galaxy”/8+ Gen 2 chips are right now (their prime core runs at 3.36GHz).

What about the rumor that the 8 Gen 3 prime core will run at 3.7GHz? That will be impressive to see in a passively-cooled, battery-powered device, but even the new node (TSMC N4P instead of N4) might not be enough to pull that off. And judging by these (admittedly very early) benchmark results, Qualcomm and TSMC haven’t gotten as high as 3.7GHz.

There’s always the possibility that some performance mode may have capped the top speed (that’s always a question with benchmarks we didn’t run ourselves). It’s also not clear whether this is a “for Galaxy” chip – Samsung allegedly extended the Qualcomm deal to next year as well.

Even if not, the boost over the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy is pretty sizable for one generation – +12% single-core and +26% multi-core uplift for the new chip. The single-core performance still lags behind Apple’s A16 chip, but the multi-core score is ahead.

Of course, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 will have to contend with the A17, not the A16, for the top spot in the performance rankings. And Apple bought up almost all of the 3nm capacity to build its chips, so it will have a node advantage.