Qualcomm revealed the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 flagship SoC in September this year. Since then, we have seen a couple of new flagships launching with this chipset. In fact, we expect it to be popular until mid-2026, when the brand may introduce a new variant or launch its sequel. Besides the flagship champion, the company also introduced a special and all-new Snapdragon 8 Gen 5, not as powerful as the 8 Elite, but still powerful enough to be above every other CPU in Snapdragon’s family. Qualcomm didn’t explicitly say when the chipset would be available, but this has changed now, with the official announcement – The Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 will launch on November 26.
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 Comes on November 26
Unfortunately, today we have only the launch date announcement. The official details about this chipset are still unavailable. Back in September, it was described as a mobile platform developed “to give you more choices and flexibility, while still delivering flagship features”. The company also confirmed later that, like its big brother, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 is built on a 3nm process, but with prime and performance cores having a maximum clock speed of 3.8 GHz and 3.32 GHz, respectively. For comparison, the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 prime cores reach a whopping 4.6 GHz, while the performance cores are set up at 3.62 GHz.So far, rumors have been pointing to a 1+7 configuration for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5. However, the reliable tipster Digital Chat Station claimed it will come with a 2+6 configuration like the Elite. That means two prime cores and six performance cores. The tipster also says that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 will keep the Adreno 840 GPU, but its performance is not the same as the Elite counterpart.
A New SoC For Flagship Killers
Interestingly, there are still some flagships launching with the Snapdragon 8 Elite, like the Redmi K90 or the OnePlus Ace 6. We expect this particular role of “cost-effective” flagship CPU to be filled by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 in the coming months. So we might see a wave of the so-called flagship killers, sporting this CPU. Curiously, we wouldn’t be surprised to see a Chinese smartphone launching with this CPU shortly after its announcement.
