Qualcomm had already developed a more powerful version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, but it was exclusive to the Galaxy S23 lineup and called the ‘Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy.’ It appears that the exclusivity period is over for Samsung, as the ‘upgraded’ SoC was benchmarked while powering a gaming smartphone. It may also receive a name re-badging and be called the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2.

New AnTuTu results show the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2 running in the Red Magic 8S Pro

On Weibo, Digital chatter has shared an image of the Red Magic 8S Pro, an upcoming gaming smartphone that has supposedly been tested with the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2, or Snapdragon 8+ Gen 2. If you take a look at the AnTuTu leaderboards, the fastest Android handset on the charts is the Red Magic 8 Pro Plus, which obtained a score of more than 1.3 million. The Red Magic 8S Pro, with the slightly more powerful SoC, got a score of more than 1.7 million when running the same benchmark.

The tipster also states that the Red Magic 8S Pro will come equipped with an active cooling fan, which probably contributed to that high AnTuTu score, but it was not mentioned if the cooler was present in the smartphone or if it was a separate accessory. What we do know is that the rumors refuting the existence of the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2 have been laid to rest, hinting that it might officially launch for a few select models.

However, what is puzzling is that the Snapdragon Summit has been officially announced, with Qualcomm expected to announce the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 on October 24. Going by this schedule, the San Diego chipset maker only has less than five months to unveil the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2. To bring you up to speed on what similarities we may see with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy, the Cortex-X3’s clock speed will likely increase from the default 3.20GHz to 3.36GHz, with the GPU frequency expected to increase from 680MHz to 719MHz.

The same TSMC 4nm process will probably be utilized, and we believe that the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2 will be produced in small batches, as Qualcomm is most likely focusing on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 launch instead. At this stage, we are unaware of the date the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2 will be unveiled, but we will not be surprised if it gets unveiled in a few weeks.

News Source: Weibo