Home > Smartphone processors comparison > Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs A15 Bionic – what's better?

Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs A15 Bionic

Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
VS
A15 Bionic
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
A15 Bionic

We compared the 8-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 (Adreno 740) with the older 6-core Apple A15 Bionic (Apple A15 GPU) SoC. Here you will find the pros and cons of each chip, technical specs, and comprehensive tests in benchmarks, like AnTuTu and Geekbench.

  1. Review
  2. Differences
  3. Benchmarks
  4. AnTuTu v11
  5. GeekBench 6
  6. Gaming
  7. Specs
  8. Comments (40)

Review

General comparison of performance, power consumption, and other indicators
CPU Performance
Single and multi-core processor tests
Gaming Performance
GPU performance in games and OpenCL/Vulkan
Battery life
Efficiency of battery consumption
NanoReview Score
Overall chip score

Key Differences

Main differences and advantages of each chip
Pros of Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
  • Supports 97% higher memory bandwidth (67.2 against 34.1 GB/s)
  • Has 2 more cores
  • Has a smaller size transistor (4 versus 5 nm)
  • Performs 22% better in floating-point computations
  • Shows better (up to 24%) AnTuTu 11 score – 1757K vs 1413K
  • Better instruction set architecture
Pros of Apple A15 Bionic
  • Higher GPU frequency (~2x)

Benchmarks

Performance tests in popular benchmarks
SoC:
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
vs
A15 Bionic

AnTuTu 11

The AnTuTu Benchmark measures CPU, GPU, RAM, and I/O performance in different scenarios
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 +24%
1757044
A15 Bionic
1413275
CPU 553922 410975
GPU 434880 370837
Memory 311861 164151
UX 456381 467312
Total score 1757044 1413275
Samples [238 tests] [69 tests]
AnTuTu results from iOS and Android are not directly comparable! They won't affect NanoReview scores.
Submit your AnTuTu result

GeekBench 6

The GeekBench test shows raw single-threaded and multithreaded CPU performance
Single-Core Score
Multi-Core Score
Asset compression 218.9 MB/sec 208.1 MB/sec
HTML 5 Browser 145.2 pages/sec 122.9 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 168.3 Mpixels/sec 139.1 Mpixels/sec
Image detection 133 images/sec 125.1 images/sec
HDR 167.2 Mpixels/sec 179.4 Mpixels/sec
Background blur 18.8 images/sec 22.3 images/sec
Photo processing 34.5 images/sec 53.2 images/sec
Ray tracing 5.78 Mpixels/sec 6.26 Mpixels/sec
Samples 132 tests 37 tests
Compute Score (GPU)
Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
9254
A15 Bionic +120%
20400
Background blur 12.3 images/sec 35.4 images/sec
Face detection 5.1 images/sec 44.8 images/sec
Horizon detection 0.53 Gpixels/sec 0.62 Gpixels/sec
Edge detection 0.56 Gpixels/sec 0.82 Gpixels/sec
Gaussian blur 0.36 Gpixels/sec 0.84 Gpixels/sec
Feature matching 0.12 Gpixels/sec 0.3 Gpixels/sec
Stereo matching 32.6 Gpixels/sec 71.1 Gpixels/sec
Particle physics 2177.4 FPS 2198.2 FPS
API OpenCL Metal
Samples 66 tests 19 tests
Compute results use different APIs (Metal vs Vulkan/OpenCL) and are not directly comparable!

3DMark

A cross-platform benchmark that assesses graphics performance in Vulkan (Metal)
3DMark Steel Nomad Light
Score 1092 -
Stability 67% -
Graphics test 8 FPS -
3DMark Solar Bay
Score 5312 3765
Stability 67% 71%
Graphics test 20 FPS 14 FPS
Section 1 23 FPS 19 FPS
Section 2 20 FPS 14 FPS
Section 3 17 FPS 9 FPS
3DMark Wild Life Extreme
Score 3667 2854
Stability 45% 76%
Graphics test 21 FPS 17 FPS

PCMark 3.0

Benchmark for evaluating overall system performance in everyday workloads
PCMark 3.0
Web score 13957 -
Video editing score 7265 -
Data manipulation score 14272 -
Photo editing score 32179 -
Writing score 17828 -
Phones tested 9 models -

Gaming

Table of average FPS and graphics settings in mobile games
PUBG Mobile 90 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
Call of Duty: Mobile 60 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
Fortnite 56 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
Shadowgun Legends 118 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
World of Tanks Blitz 120 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
Genshin Impact 59 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
Mobile Legends: Bang Bang 59 FPS
[Ultra]		 -
Device ZTE Nubia Red Magic 8 Pro
1116 x 2480		 -
We provide average results. FPS may differ, depending on game version, OS and other factors.

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-23 (Ciciz)AnTuTu 122032599
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-23 (Ciciz)AnTuTu 122032599
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-23 (Horizon377)AnTuTu 121894819
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-22 (DiKevoLi'Phone)AnTuTu 121844320
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-21 (Mil)AnTuTu 121763249
Add View all (368)
Apple A15 Bionic
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-23 -> HotPowerAnTuTu 111184759
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-19 -> HotPowerGeekbench 6 GPU21284
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-19 (Vova)AnTuTu 111297615
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-19 -> HotPowerGeekbench 6 CPU2423 / 5985
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-18 (charlesddd)AnTuTu 111461749
Add View all (115)

Specifications

Full list of technical specifications of Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 and A15 Bionic

CPU

Architecture 1x 3.2 GHz – Cortex-X3
2x 2.8 GHz – Cortex-A715
2x 2.8 GHz – Cortex-A710
3x 2 GHz – Cortex-A510		 2x 3.23 GHz – Avalanche
4x 2.02 GHz – Blizzard
Cores 8 6
Frequency 3200 MHz 3230 MHz
Instruction set ARMv9-A ARMv8.5-A
L1 cache - 256 KB
L2 cache 1 MB 12 MB
L3 cache 8 MB -
Process 4 nanometers 5 nanometers
Transistor count 16 billion 15 billion
TDP (Sustained Power Limit) 8.5 W 6 W
Manufacturing TSMC TSMC

Graphics

GPU name Adreno 740 Apple A15 GPU
Architecture Adreno 700 Apple Bionic GPU
GPU frequency 680 MHz 1338 MHz
Pipelines 3 5
Shading units 512 128
Total shaders 1536 640
FLOPS 2089 Gigaflops 1712.6 Gigaflops
Vulkan version 1.3 -
OpenCL version 2.0 -
DirectX version 12.1 -

AI Accelerator

Neural processor (NPU) Hexagon Apple Neural Engine
NPU theoretical performance - 15.8 TOPS

Memory

Memory type LPDDR5X LPDDR4X
Memory frequency 4200 MHz 2133 MHz
Bus 4x 16 Bit 4x 16 Bit
Max bandwidth 67.2 Gb/s 34.1 Gb/s
Max size 24 GB 6 GB

Multimedia (ISP)

Storage type UFS 3.1, UFS 4.0 NVMe
Max display resolution 3840 x 2160 2732 x 2048
Max camera resolution 1x 200MP -
Video capture 8K at 30FPS, 4K at 120FPS 4K at 60FPS
Video playback 8K at 60FPS, 4K at 120FPS 4K at 60FPS
Video codecs - H.264
- H.265
- AV1
- VP8
- VP9		 - H.264
- H.265
- VP8
- VP9
- Motion JPEG
Audio codecs - AAC
- AIFF
- CAF
- MP3
- MP4
- WAV		 - AAC
- AAX
- AAX+
- AC-3
- AIFF
- CAF
- E-AC-3
- MP3
- MP4
- WAV

Connectivity

Modem Snapdragon X70 -
4G support LTE Cat. 24 LTE Cat. 24
5G support Yes Yes
Download speed Up to 10000 Mbps Up to 7500 Mbps
Upload speed Up to 3500 Mbps Up to 3000 Mbps
Wi-Fi 7 6
Bluetooth 5.3 5.0
Navigation GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, QZSS, SBAS, NAVIC GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, QZSS

Info

Announced November 2022 September 2021
Class Flagship Flagship
Model number SM8550-AB APL1W07
Official page Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 official site -
Successor - Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 - Apple A19 Pro
Further details
Notes on Snapdragon 8 Gen 2:
    - There's also the "Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy," which only differs by having a 160 MHz higher CPU clock and a 39 MHz higher GPU clock, resulting in 2208.8 GFLOPS for the GPU. Generally, you won't notice this difference in real-life usage, including games.

Cast your vote

So, which SoC would you choose?
4182 (66.1%)
2140 (33.9%)
Total votes: 6322

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4. Apple A15 Bionic vs Apple A16 Bionic (26)
5. Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs MediaTek Dimensity 8350 (7)
6. Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs MediaTek Dimensity 8300 (36)
7. Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs MediaTek Dimensity 8400 (207)
8. Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 (106)
9. Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 vs Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Plus Gen 3 (18)
Compare other chipsets (190+)

Comments

Please give your opinion on the comparison of A15 Bionic and Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, or ask any questions
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Avatar
Garry December 7, 2025 at 08:22 PM
Guys I don’t know what to but I’m struggling with my decision to ethier buy a iPhone 13 pro or the Samsung s23+ cause I’m on a budget and the Samsung right now for me is good option in there w range.
+6 Reply
Avatar
Emmex001 January 8, 2026 at 11:29 PM
If you preface cool features, advanced ai and versatility go for S23, if you’d chose better optimizations, stable performance, nice eco-system, better video recording, better longevity and resale value go for the ip 13 pro. Honestly both phones are great but aside from features and android perks the iPhone 13 pro really has better overall usability
+1 Reply
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Snapdragon for Galaxy March 30, 2026 at 07:19 AM
Get the S23+ is just better
+1 Reply
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Snapdragon for Galaxy July 28, 2026 at 04:45 PM
Buy a Samsung if you need function over form
+1 Reply
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Ecstasy August 2, 2025 at 09:58 AM
My only probkem here is that i don't understand why a 2021 processor(a15) supports 120 fps in codm (br) but even snapdragon 8 gen 3 doesn't. When snapdragon kept up with this record is in the just released 8 elite which is bad. Any one know about mediatek counting i need to know if they are difference from sd.
+13 Reply
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Jerry December 3, 2025 at 03:05 AM
Exactly, it took 8 elite and dimensity 9400 to catch up to 120fps in codm and i hate that so much because my old snapdragon 870 phone can play 100+ fps stable on br when i used lsposed to spoof my device model, im sure 8 gen 2 and above can play 120fps just fine
+3 Reply
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codm June 20, 2026 at 09:09 AM
Prolly CODM devs being choosy and prioritizing iOS more than Android. Idk why they can't just make an open FPS limit like Blood Strike lmao.
0 Reply
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Tehseen mughal January 28, 2025 at 05:48 AM
Apple chipsets are always ahead of time specialy a15 bionic is still very powerful even a14 bionic also perform amazing no any snapdragon or dimensity even come close to the a15 bionic apple is the best πŸ₯°
+21 Reply
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SomeoneWhoReplies February 3, 2025 at 05:47 AM
Are you drunk? the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 surpasses both the A15 and A16 Bionic now. Heck, even it's matched against the A17 Pro. Now, the Snapdragon 8 Elite overtakes the A18 Pro now in multi core processing and is actually catching up to single core
+52 Reply
Avatar
Anonymous June 1, 2025 at 10:02 AM
SomeoneWhoReplies, You're all missing the point. It's not about how many cores you have, it's about how strong each core is. The A18 pro chip is a beast, and if it had 8 cores, it would be the most powerful chip on the market.πŸ”₯
+4 Reply
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lol August 30, 2025 at 04:41 AM
Anonymous , Then what's stopping Apple from having 8 cores? Why don't they just annihilate the competition by doing that?
+9 Reply
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lol August 30, 2025 at 07:33 AM
lol, So the M series chipsets don’t exist… The same M series chipsets that make laptops have long battery lifes while having extremely good performance
0 Reply
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Noah July 6, 2024 at 01:36 AM
I'm surprised that A15 is 10~20% higher on Single and multi core CPU scores than 8 gen 2 and 8 gen 2 was 1year newer
+50 Reply
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69LoL420 June 29, 2023 at 06:26 PM
if you compare the price of a snapdragon gen 2 to an a15 just go with the one on discount.
+155 Reply
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easzqzylhq November 30, 2024 at 02:52 PM
snapdragon 8 Gen2
+7 Reply
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JJJ February 15, 2023 at 12:30 PM
Will you people stop already? They are both AMAZING and way more than needed for any phone. What is it with people and the need for "mine is better than yours "?
+76 Reply
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Amen April 30, 2023 at 06:05 AM
Exactly! I'm glad everyone can pick between Android and iOS as they wish, that's why the markets have multiple options for devices! iOS has been catching up with Android lately in terms of customization and honestly, I think the differences between these two are now just the personal preference of the user. Being a fanboy is just childish, just like console vs. PC.
+18 Reply
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roy August 16, 2023 at 01:46 PM
Amen, if then, console = ios. pc = android. lol
+11 Reply
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Sam October 8, 2023 at 09:15 PM
So if your latest Snapdragon processor can't outperform a year-old Apple processor, you justify the inferior Snapdragon by claiming both are good and shouldn't be compared? I understand it's difficult for Android enthusiasts to accept, but it's clear that the newest Snapdragon processors are three generations behind Apple's latest.
+53 Reply
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Snapdragon for Galaxy March 30, 2026 at 07:21 AM
Especially when all they're gonna be doing on their phones is playing Subway surfers and typing messages on Whatsapp. Lol it's ridiculous.
0 Reply
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Jojo December 11, 2022 at 04:03 PM
Even though the chips are good, the android os still can't beat the apple os in terms of stability, security, etc. But it's good IF the Android os can beat the apple os since the android chip can beat the apple chip; moreover, the phone is CHEAP! I can't wait for this to happen. Common sense? Does anyone agree?
+78 Reply
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kultar singh January 19, 2023 at 09:02 PM
these benchmarks are done on android devices with snapdragon 8 gen 2 in them which means that Android os is becoming more and more stable and it is now comparable with ios.
+63 Reply
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tim December 9, 2022 at 04:03 PM
gen2's antutu gpu score is almost 2 times that of apple's. really crazy to see how far they've come
+60 Reply
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Mask March 14, 2023 at 06:28 AM
IOS and Android Antutu platforms are different. You can't compare those two.
+19 Reply
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Matt March 16, 2023 at 06:48 AM
Mask, Of course, that only applies when Apple is losing, doesn't it? The same thing happens with Geekbench, but you guys say nothing. Geekbench is known to heavily favor Apple because its inflated benchmarks don't translate into real-world performance. In fact, the only reason their numbers appeared to hold up was that people were looking at loading times and mistakenly thinking it was the CPU affecting most of that when, in reality, it was the storage, which is the one area where Apple was superior until now. What do you know, Samsung gets faster storage now and wins in load times against the A16, yet Geekbench 5 still has the audacity to give the A15 a significant win.
+39 Reply
Avatar
Digo. April 6, 2023 at 09:31 PM
Matt, Geekbench is a universal CPU benchmark that measures the raw power of a CPU in any operating system, including PC SoCs. Antutu is not directly comparable between Android and iOS, as explicitly stated on their website.
+7 Reply
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oogway. June 6, 2023 at 03:33 PM
Digo., Geekbench heavily favors iOS because it runs on the Metal API. The performance you see on Geekbench doesn't necessarily translate to real-world tasks.
+14 Reply
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roy August 16, 2023 at 01:47 PM
Mask, But bro, when we're working on apps, they run on the same OS and APIs that Antutu uses. So, Snapdragon wins.
+1 Reply
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roy August 16, 2023 at 01:48 PM
Matt, Geekbench sponsored by Apple's subsidiary software company
+3 Reply
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Steav January 16, 2024 at 10:18 PM
Matt, The Snapdragon is two years behind the A15. My iPhone 13, equipped with the A15 chip, scores 1,413,389 points in AnTuTu during the same period. My friend owns a Samsung and he experiences glitches in Genshin Impact. Meanwhile, I have no lag issues during play.
+14 Reply
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boomer May 4, 2024 at 06:06 AM
oogway., Yep...That's why dedicated Android gaming phones with the latest Snapdragon SoC can't play console-level AAA games like the iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max.
+1 Reply
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Clutch December 18, 2025 at 06:30 PM
boomer, Woah, that's not true, not even at the time your reply was written. Heck, I'd say Android has the largest library of console-level AAA games, big thanks to x86 translation software. But even without that, Android also got AAA console ports. You can even run older games (like Skyrim, which I love playing on my phone) on a budget if your phone is less powerful. I've watched an 8 Elite brute force a higher framerate using x86 translation than a native port on the latest iPhone at the time (16 Pro Max).
0 Reply
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Snapdragon sensation February 12, 2026 at 07:14 PM
Steav, You have the developers of Genshin to blame for that while they keep licking apple's ass when it comes to developing games for iOS. Lol, plus there is just more profit for developers when developing games for iOS platform.
0 Reply
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monticello November 20, 2022 at 02:46 AM
A15 heat control is better than Gen2.
+56 Reply
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will November 28, 2022 at 04:05 AM
How do you know about this?
+52 Reply
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Lol December 3, 2022 at 04:49 AM
Bruh who said that apple don't have any vapour colingwood system so it is a win-win situation
+14 Reply
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im not givin out my name December 21, 2022 at 07:15 PM
actually, the 8 gen 2 consumes less power, has better performance per watt, and is faster. that's compared to the a16, not the a15.
+69 Reply
Avatar
roy August 16, 2023 at 01:51 PM
According to specs and practical results, the 8 Gen 2 is more efficient. It offers higher performance than the A15, consumes less power, and has a superior manufacturing process (5nm vs. 4nm).
+7 Reply
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roy August 16, 2023 at 01:52 PM
Lol, Even though they incorporated a vapor chamber, the performance still falls short because the iPhone is made of a poorer heat-conducting material: stainless steel, as opposed to aluminum.
+23 Reply
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Snapdragon sensation February 12, 2026 at 07:28 PM
roy, iPhones have been struggling with thermal throttling during prolonged gaming for a long time and yet people refused to talk about this especially tech reviewers because they want to keep receiving free units from Apple for their YouTube channel.. Pathetic!, The media has betrayed me and I can't trust these big tech YouTubers anymore.. I bought an iPhone 12 a while back in 2021 and the performance was great however the phone quickly gets hot and frame rates drops significantly just after 5 minutes of gaming.. Yet when I go to watch reviews about the iPhone 12, it's all positive, people in United States and all over the world keep praising it while I'm just sitting in my room with my iPhone 12 rethinking my life choices.. fast forward 2 years later in 2023 and I got another iPhone being iPhone 15 pro max and performance was great but still the same issue again, thermal throttling and screen dimming and yet nobody talked about it so I tried Galaxy S23 ultra and the difference was noticeable, better heat control, better sustained performance and performance per watt, literally all my games ran at a solid 120fps. That's when I realised that Apple has the media in its pocket, so many people bend over for Apple to f**k them in the ass and give them their latest iPhone for review. The world is cursed.
+2 Reply
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