Qualcomm launches the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 SoC. It’s intended to power budget mid-range phones and has some interesting features that we also find on its bigger brother.

Qualcomm is launching the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 after the company previously introduced the flagship Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 to the world. The Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 is aimed at mid-range phones. On the CPU side, the chip has a total of eight cores on board in a 1+3+4 configuration. A powerful Kryo core has a clock speed of 2.63 GHz and is supported by three slightly weaker 2.4 GHz cores and four efficient 1.8 GHz cores. Qualcomm claims that the CPU is fifteen percent more powerful than that of the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1.

GPU and NPU

Qualcomm also equips the SoC with an Adreno GPU that is 50 percent more powerful than that of the Gen 1. According to the chip designer, the entire chip is around twenty percent more efficient than its predecessor. To be clear: Qualcomm itself sees the Snapdragon Gen 1 as a direct predecessor, while the 7+ Gen 2 and 7s Gen 2 remain somewhere between Gen 1 and Gen 3.

Like the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, the new chip has an NPU chiplet. The Hexagon-NOU is said to offer 60 percent more AI computing power per watt and support AI functions directly on the mobile device. Samsung, among others, is already working hard on specific applications. Honor, among others, is already planning smartphones with the new chip.