Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 will power flagship smartphones in 2022.
Highlights:
- Snapdragon® 8 Gen 1 leads the way into a new era of premium mobile technology
- Most advanced 5G mobile platform and the world’s first 5G modem-RF solution to reach 10 Gigabit download speeds
- Snapdragon Sight™ Camera Technology includes the first commercial 18-bit mobile IS
- Industry-leading on-device AI powered by the 7th Gen Qualcomm® AI Engine
- 4th Gen Snapdragon Elite Gaming™ features offer desktop-level gaming experiences to surpass the demands of mobile gamers
- World’s first platform compliant with the Android Ready Secure Element (SE) Alliance
Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. unveiled its next premium 5G mobile platform, Snapdragon® 8 Gen 1, during the annual Snapdragon Tech Summit 2021. With cutting-edge 5G, AI, gaming, camera, and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth® capabilities, the new Snapdragon 8 ushers in a new age of premium mobile technology. Global OEMs and brands including Black Shark, Honor, iQOO, Motorola, Nubia, OnePlus, OPPO, Realme, Redmi, SHARP, Sony Corporation, Vivo, Xiaomi, and ZTE will use the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, with commercial devices expected by the end of 2021.
“As the world’s most advanced mobile platform, Snapdragon is synonymous with premium Android experiences and the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 sets the standard for the next generation of flagship mobile devices,” said Alex Katouzian, senior vice president and general manager of mobile, compute, and infrastructure, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “It delivers connectivity, photography, AI, gaming, sound, and security experiences never before available in a smartphone.”
Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Key Features:
Connectivity:
The Snapdragon 8 is the most advanced 5G mobile platform and the world’s first 5G modem-RF solution to deliver 10 Gigabit download speeds, thanks to the Snapdragon X65 5G Modem-RF System. The Qualcomm® FastConnectTM 6900 Mobile Connectivity System in the Snapdragon 8 supports the fastest Wi-Fi speeds available—up to 3.6 Gbps—over Wi-Fi 6 and 6E, ensuring that games and apps run seamlessly even when numerous devices are connected to the same network.
Camera:
This new premium smartphone platform elevates smartphone photography to the next level. Snapdragon SightTM Technology incorporates the world’s first commercial 18-bit mobile ISP, which captures over 4000 times more camera data than its predecessor for extraordinary dynamic range, color, and clarity at 3.2 gigapixels per second. This is also the first 8K HDR video capture on a mobile platform, and it can capture in the premium HDR10+ format, which has over a billion color colors. The new Bokeh Engine, which creates gorgeous soft backgrounds to films, will make them even more appealing; it is like Portrait Mode for video capturing. The new Always-On ISP in Snapdragon 8 allows the camera to run with exceptionally low power consumption, allowing customers to experience always-on face unlocking and locking if their face is not present for heightened privacy.
AI:
The Qualcomm® HexagonTM processor powers the 7th Gen Qualcomm AI Engine, which has a 2x faster tensor accelerator and 2x greater shared memory than its predecessor. The smartly integrated Leica Leitz Look filters allow users to take pro-quality photographs, re-creating the iconic bokeh effect. By prioritizing and analyzing your alerts, Hugging Face’s latest AI-based natural language processing can intelligently function as your personal assistant. We are collaborating with Sonde Health to employ on-device AI to speed up their models that evaluate a user’s speech patterns to see whether they are at risk for health issues like asthma, depression, or COVID-19. The 3rd Gen Qualcomm® Sensing Hub also powers a new always-on AI system that processes additional data streams utilizing low-power AI.
Gaming:
Snapdragon 8 boasts ultra-smooth responsiveness, color-rich HDR scenes at the greatest visual quality, and desktop-level capabilities that are mobile-firsts, thanks to over 50 Snapdragon Elite Gaming features. The new Qualcomm® AdrenoTM GPU unlocks a new generation of mobile GPUs by providing a 30% gain in graphics rendering capabilities and a 25% improvement in power efficiency over the previous generation. The platform includes the Adreno Frame Motion Engine, which can produce twice as many frames while using the same amount of power. Variable Rate Shading Pro is another mobile-first feature that gives game makers a finer grain of control over game performance. Volumetric rendering, which has been optimized for smartphones by Qualcomm Technologies’ Snapdragon Studios, delivers unsurpassed realism to fog, smoke, and particle effects.
Sound:
With integrated Bluetooth 5.2 and Snapdragon SoundTM Technology, users can enjoy a new level of crisp, crystal-clear voice and music, including Qualcomm® aptXTM Lossless Technology for CD-quality lossless wireless audio. This is the first Snapdragon mobile platform to provide brand-new LE audio features for gaming, including broadcast audio, stereo recording, and voice back-channel.
Security
The Snapdragon 8 has vault-like security to help protect users’ data. This is the first Snapdragon platform to include a dedicated Trust Management Engine, which strengthens security and adds another layer of trust to apps and services. Snapdragon 8 is also the first mobile platform to support Android Ready SE, the new standard for digital automobile keys, driver’s licenses, and other security features. In addition, the Qualcomm® Secure Processing Unit supports iSIM, an integrated SIM card that allows users to connect to cellular networks quickly and securely without the necessity of a SIM card.