The Snapdragon 8 Elite’s new name is a big deal. But does it really matter?

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Summit is happening correct now, and during nan large opening keynote, Qualcomm revealed nan adjacent awesome spot for premium Android flagships successful 2025: the Snapdragon 8 Elite.

Wait, what happened to Snapdragon 8 Gen 4? That’s what we were each expecting, fixed nan elemental sanction that Qualcomm’s been utilizing for nan past respective years pinch Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, Gen 2, Gen 1, and truthful forth.

But no, Qualcomm decided nan caller spot needed a caller sanction to really show really overmuch of an upgrade nan Snapdragon 8 Elite is compared to erstwhile generations. This besides makes nan smartphone chips lucifer up pinch nan company’s Snapdragon X Elite laptop chipsets. With a small spot of context, it starts to make immoderate sense.

However, does anyone who isn’t a tech enthusiast cognize nan sanction of nan processors that are successful their smartphones? Does nan sanction really matter?

What’s successful a name?

Qualcomm

Qualcomm Snapdragon, MediaTek Dimensity, Samsung Exynos, Google Tensor, Apple A18, Apple M4. To a normal person, personification who doesn’t travel tech news each day, would they cognize what immoderate of those words mean? I will confidently say, astir apt not.

These days, everyone beautiful overmuch has a smartphone of immoderate kind, whether it’s an iPhone aliases immoderate benignant of Android phone. But inquire them what processor aliases spot it has, and astir group will apt springiness you a blank stare. Unless you are a techie, group conscionable don’t really attraction astir processors and benchmarks — nan only point that matters is whether nan telephone will activity good capable for what they request it for.

While saying Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 is simply a spot of a mouthful, it made nan astir consciousness logistically. It was easy to show which was nan newest type since it was successful numerical order. But past Qualcomm made things a spot much analyzable by branching nan Snapdragon 8 bid into Plus and “s” variations — astir precocious pinch the Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 announced earlier this year.

Qualcomm

The Snapdragon 8 Elite is simply a caller rebrand of nan flagship chip, pinch a sanction that supposedly matches nan performance. When Qualcomm showed disconnected nan chip, it stated that it has zero ratio cores. Instead, nan Snapdragon 8 Elite will person six capacity cores and 2 premier cores. For immoderate other context, nan Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 has 5 capacity cores, 2 ratio cores, and 1 premier halfway — and nan premier halfway delivers much horsepower than nan capacity cores.

With nan premier cores going up to 4.32GHz and nan capacity cores clocked astatine 3.53GHz (the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 only sewage up to 3.2GHz), nan Snapdragon 8 Elite should present 45% amended wide CPU capacity and 44% amended efficiency.

So, yes, though this rebranding of nan Snapdragon 8 does make consciousness erstwhile you look astatine nan performance, was it really necessary? After all, astir group already don’t cognize nan nonstop names of nan chips that their pouch computers have, truthful does it really matter? Probably not. It’s conscionable a trading maneuver for Qualcomm to usage successful its property releases, and beyond america tech journalists and bloggers covering nan news this week, nan chances are slim to nary of “normal” group caring aliases knowing astir it astatine all.

This isn’t Qualcomm’s first rebranding rodeo

Qualcomm

Rebranding Snapdragon 8 Gen to Snapdragon 8 Elite isn’t nan first clip that Qualcomm has changed things up. In fact, Qualcomm conscionable rebranded nan Snapdragon spot sanction backmost successful 2021, going from various digits (i.e. Snapdragon 888, 870, 480, etc.) to procreation numbers. As such, it’s a spot astonishing to spot Qualcomm rebrand it yet again aft conscionable 3 years.

It will beryllium absorbing to spot what Qualcomm does pinch its premium flagship spot adjacent year. Will it beryllium “Snapdragon 8 Elite 2” aliases thing similar? Or will it person a caller connection alternatively of Elite? Will Qualcomm’s adjacent spot beryllium different monumental leap that it decides to do another major rebrand? At this point, we don’t really know.

Rebranding to Snapdragon 8 Elite makes consciousness from a definite perspective. At slightest it is simple, dissimilar thing for illustration Asus ROG Strix XG27AQDMG. But successful nan end, does anyone really attraction astir nan sanction of nan chipset successful their smartphone? So agelong arsenic it’s accelerated and efficient, that’s each that really matters. And thankfully for Qualcomm, it seems for illustration nan Snapdragon 8 Elite has that successful spades. It looks for illustration a very bully chip; conscionable 1 pinch an overseas sanction that — for astir group — yet doesn’t matter.