According to the prolific leaker who goes by Digital Chat Station on Weibo, Qualcomm is working on a new iteration of its Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 SoC to be launched later this year. This will reportedly have the model number SM8850-1-AB, and will have very similar Geekbench 6 scores to the standard Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5.
DCS says it will be used in devices costing under CNY 4,000, which is $590 at the current exchange rate. That implies it will be cheaper than the standard Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, which has the model number SM8850-AC.
For reference, note that there are already three versions of this chipset out there. Aside from the standard one, there’s also the SM8850-5-AC, which has a seven-core CPU instead of octa-core, and is used in Oppo’s Find N6. Finally, the SM8850-1-AD is the one Samsung uses in its Galaxy S26 family and Galaxy Z Fold8 series.
So the new one would be the fourth iteration. It will be interesting to see which ‘flagship killer’ type devices will go for this one instead of making the jump to the presumably much more expensive Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6.
Source (in Chinese)
