At this year’s Snapdragon Tech Summit, Qualcomm has introduced its newest flagship mobile platform, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Mobile Platform. Building on the technologies of the Snapdragon 888+ 5G, this new flagship chip offers a host of upgrades including improvements in connectivity, cameras, AI, and more.
Debuting is the first 18-bit ISP for mobile from Qualcomm, Snapdragon Sight. This new development unlocks more powerful camera capabilities and features that aim to close the gap between smartphones and professional cameras,
Snapdragon Sight offers extreme dynamic range, color, and sharpness with speeds up to 3.2 gigapixels per second. Being a triple ISP, cameras can be used to capture photos or videos all at the same time.
Another first for this chip includes support for in-mobile 8K HDR video capture. There’s also support for over a billion shades of color.
As for low-light situations, Qualcomm lets devices snap 30 images and its internal software will analyze and merge the best parts of each to create a better overall photo with shape details and vivid color.
On the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 is the company’s most advanced 5G platform with the first 3GPP release 16 5G solution. Download speeds are enhanced thanks to the 4th gen Snapdragon X65 5G modem-RF system that boasts of being the world’s first 10 Gigabit 5G modern-RF solution. Network speeds are maximized by Qualcomm FastConnect 6900 which offers up to 3.5Gbps over Wi-Fi 6 and 6E.
To improve sound, Qualcomm equips the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 with its Snapdragon Sound tech that now features Qualcomm aptX lossless technology for CD-quality wireless audio.
On the AI front, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 features a handful of new developments including the faster AI engine the company has ever injected into a processor.
Being four times faster this time around, the onboard AI is able to analyze, intelligently group, and prioritize using natural language processing from Hugging Face. The AI also helps in recreating better-looking bokeh and color in photos using the integrated Leica Leitz Looks filters.
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Mobile Platform focuses heavily on using AI to improve audio experiences. To that effect, it supports lossless audio over Bluetooth and low latency gaming so that you can enjoy an immersive gaming experience with no lag between phone and earbuds.
Using AI, the platform is also able to pull off some advanced audio “tricks”. For example, using Noise Suppression, the platform can block out background noise from a recording. You can watch the video below for a demo. The platform also supports Audio Context detection, so for example, if you’re listening to music on your earbuds, and a baby is crying nearby, you could be alerted.
When it comes to imaging, the platform is able o capture 4K video, and the on-device AI is able to automatically classify your content. Real-time action recognition helps identify action highlights; Automatically generating tags so that for example, automatic slow-motion can be applied at just the right moment.
We also took a look at a reference design device built on the platform that offers a 140-degree field of view with no distortion, at 16MP. In contrast, most devices on the market offer a 125-degree field of view that comes with distortion.
Additionally, the 7th Gen Qualcomm Artificial Intelligence Engine alongside the always-on 3rd Gen Qualcomm Sensing Hub and Hexagon processor offers a tensor accelerator that’s twice as fast and memory that’s the size of its predecessor.
In gaming, improvements and enhancements are also present and now offer support for volumetric rendering, adding realism and depth to game environments. Support for the Unreal Engine 5 also means better overall effects and sequences in-game for a fuller, more immersive experience. Full Snapdragon Elite Gaming features are also present.
Aiming to offer “desktop-level” features, a Qualcomm Adreno GPU is installed to provide 30 percent more power and 25 percent more efficiency compared to its predecessor.