Qualcomm’s new SoC, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 , was unveiled on Wednesday, December 1st, and Android manufacturers are already announcing the first smartphones that will feature the high-end chip in 2022.
It’s almost a tradition: every time Qualcomm introduces a new mobile processor at its annual Tech Summit conference , a number of Android “partner” manufacturers battle over whose flagship will be the first with the SoC.
Like last year, it’s Xiaomi who claims that its Xiaomi 12 will be the first Android smartphone with Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 (although no date has yet been announced for the handset expected in December). Oppo closely followed Xiaomi’s announcement and promised that its next smartphone flagship would also feature Qualcomm’s latest SoC. Again, there’s no release date for the potential Oppo Find X4 Pro just yet.
“We are committed to bringing consumers high-quality 5G smartphones such as the Find X3 series, so we are very excited to launch the Snapdragon 8 platform,” said Scott Zhang, Oppo’s vice president of overseas sales. We don’t find out more for now.
Honor, OnePlus, Realme and Co. will of course follow… and what about Samsung?
As you can imagine, don’t rely on those mere marketing announcements yelling “here” when you don’t even have a planned release date for your smartphone yet. But be that as it may: As every year in recent years, almost every high-end Android smartphone will be equipped with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 in 2022.
Qualcomm has published a list of brands committed to launching a device with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, including Black Shark, Honor, iQOO, Motorola, Nubia, OnePlus, OPPO, Realme, Redmi, SHARP, Sony Corporation, Vivo, Xiaomi and ZTE. Xiaomi seems to be the manufacturer where the integration of the Qualcomm chip seems to be the most advanced in time. The Chinese have spoken out with a small video glimpse to show that mass production of the Xiaomi 12 with Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 has already started.
Interestingly, Samsung is not included in Qualcomm’s list, although the South Korean giant’s upcoming Galaxy S22 is likely to feature the “Snapdragon 8 Gen 1” processor in some regions.
