The Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 is 35% smaller than the 8 Gen 3: take a look!

Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SoC is to be found in numerous current Android flagships – it's getting all the love! It deserves it – it's fast, it's capable, it's top of the line.

Recently, this king of the mobile tech jungle got a spin-off version: the AI-centric Snapdragon 8s Gen 3, which was released less than a month ago.

Now, Gizmochina's report is asking the real questions: "Does the 's' in the Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 mean 'small'?"

That's because, as it turns out, the 8s Gen 3 is 35% smaller than the 8 Gen 3.

What's a SoC?

SoC, or System-on-Chip, combines all or most components of a computer or other electronic system onto a single chip. It includes a central processing unit (CPU), memory interfaces (for RAM, ROM), input/output devices interface, and often other features such as a graphics processing unit (GPU), a communications module (e.g., Wi-Fi, Bluetooth), and more.

Is it that small?

Apart from being small, the Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 is less expensive than its bigger, non-'s' sibling, catering to those seeking a balance between performance and cost.

Qualcomm's latest SoC, as showcased in ITHome's latest findings, is far more compact than its standard counterpart, measuring 8.40x10.66mm. This represents a significant 34.73% reduction in size compared to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3's larger 10.71x12.81mm dimensions.



Of course, being more budget-friendly and small, the 8s Gen 3 introduces compromises, as it features a scaled-down cache configuration. Notably, the top-tier X4 core's L2 cache is cut from 2MB to 1MB, with similar reductions seen across its L2, L3, and SLC caches.

While the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 leverages TSMC’s 4nm manufacturing process and boasts a CPU setup including a 3.3GHz X4 core among others, coupled with the Adreno 750 GPU, the Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 maintains the 4nm process but opts for a slightly different architecture. It has a 3GHz X4 core, four 2.8GHz A720 cores, three 2GHz A520 cores, and incorporates the Adreno 735 GPU, which lacks certain advanced graphics capabilities like global illumination effects.

The Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 further diverges in terms of memory support, peaking at 4200MHz LPDDR5X versus the 4800MHz supported by the 8 Gen 3. It also offers more limited video capabilities, supporting 4K HDR recording over the 8 Gen 3's 8K HDR, and comes with an older X70 baseband which impacts theoretical network speeds compared to the 8 Gen 3's X75.