Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 processor to rival Exynos 1380

Qualcomm has unveiled a new chipset for mobile devices, the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 Mobile Platform (SM7435-AB). With the announcement of this SoC, there are now three models in the Snapdragon 7 lineup, with the other two being the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1 and the Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2.

The chipset announced today, however, is neither related to the other two models in the series nor there was a first-generation of this SoC. So, it’s unclear why the company is calling this chipset “Gen 2”. Anyway, here’s what it offers.

Qualcomm Snapdrag0n 7s Gen 2 features and specifications

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 is made on Samsung Foundry's 4nm fabrication process. According to the company, the SoC features ‘Kryo' CPU cores with “peak speeds up to 2.4 GHz.” The company has neither revealed how many CPU cores the chipset has nor the exact model of those CPU cores. According to multiple reports online, there are four performance CPU cores clocked at 2.4GHz and four efficiency CPU cores clocked at 1.95GHz.

According to Qualcomm, the chipset has an Adreno GPU, but once again, the company hasn’t revealed the exact model of the graphics unit. The spec sheet says that it can drive Full HD+ displays at a 144Hz refresh rate. The SoC supports LPDDR5 RAM with speeds up to 3,200MHz. On the imaging front, there’s a Qualcomm Spectra image signal processor (ISP) onboard that can run cameras up to 200MP and record 4K videos at 30 fps. That means it supports the 200MP Samsung ISOCELL HPX, ISOCELL HP2, and ISOCELL HP3 camera sensors.

As for the connectivity, the chipset uses the Snapdragon X62 5G Modem that supports sub-6GHz and mmWave 5G with peak download speeds of up to 2.9Gbps. For Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, there’s Qualcomm FastConnect 6700 onboard, which offers Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2. Location services include dual-band (L1/L5) QZSS, Galileo, Beidou, NavIC, GLONASS, and GPS. As you might expect, the SoC supports the USB Type-C interface with USB 3.1 speed. There’s also Qualcomm Quick Charge 4+ onboard.

Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 competes directly with the Exynos 1380

Going by these specs, the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 seems to be made for higher mid-range phones. More importantly, the features of this chipset are very similar to that of the Samsung Exynos 1380, which powers many devices from Samsung, including the Galaxy A54, Galaxy M54, and the Galaxy F54.

Since the two SoCs are very similar in terms of features, it's hard to tell which one is better. We'll have to wait for reviews of phones powered by the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 to see if it is better than its rival from Samsung.