Snapdragon 865 vs A14 Bionic

We compared the 8-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 (Adreno 650) with the newer 6-core Apple A14 Bionic (Apple A14 GPU) SoC. Here you will find the pros and cons of each chip, technical specs, and comprehensive tests in benchmarks, like AnTuTu and Geekbench.

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 865
  • Performs 38% better in floating-point computations
  • Has 2 more cores
  • Supports 29% higher memory bandwidth (44 against 34.1 GB/s)
Pros of Apple A14 Bionic
  • Higher GPU frequency (~2.2x)
  • Has a smaller size transistor (5 versus 7 nm)
  • Shows better (up to 36%) AnTuTu 11 score – 1326K vs 978K
  • 9% higher CPU clock speed (3100 vs 2840 MHz)
  • Better instruction set architecture

Benchmarks

Performance tests in popular benchmarks

AnTuTu 11

The AnTuTu Benchmark measures CPU, GPU, RAM, and I/O performance in different scenarios
A14 Bionic +36%
1326975
CPU 385127 364692
GPU 148169 311592
Memory 166070 180518
UX 279544 470169
Total score 978910 1326975
Samples [104 tests] [55 tests]
AnTuTu results from iOS and Android are not directly comparable! They won't affect NanoReview scores.

GeekBench 6

The GeekBench test shows raw single-threaded and multithreaded CPU performance
Single-Core Score
A14 Bionic +79%
2095
Multi-Core Score
A14 Bionic +66%
5297
Asset compression 149.1 MB/sec 182.6 MB/sec
HTML 5 Browser 87.2 pages/sec 110.6 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 125.3 Mpixels/sec 123.2 Mpixels/sec
Image detection 77 images/sec 104.9 images/sec
HDR 106.3 Mpixels/sec 164.1 Mpixels/sec
Background blur 11 images/sec 19.1 images/sec
Photo processing 32.7 images/sec 50.8 images/sec
Ray tracing 4.29 Mpixels/sec 5.36 Mpixels/sec
Samples 52 tests 22 tests
Compute Score (GPU)
A14 Bionic +307%
16822
Background blur 4.53 images/sec 27.6 images/sec
Face detection 1.97 images/sec 35.2 images/sec
Horizon detection 0.17 Gpixels/sec 0.54 Gpixels/sec
Edge detection 0.22 Gpixels/sec 0.79 Gpixels/sec
Gaussian blur 0.18 Gpixels/sec 0.83 Gpixels/sec
Feature matching 0.02 Gpixels/sec 0.24 Gpixels/sec
Stereo matching 9.05 Gpixels/sec 50.5 Gpixels/sec
Particle physics 567.3 FPS 1772.1 FPS
API OpenCL Metal
Samples 34 tests 17 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 Solar Bay
Score - 2767
Stability - 85%
Graphics test - 11 FPS
Section 1 - 13 FPS
Section 2 - 10 FPS
Section 3 - 8 FPS
3DMark Wild Life Extreme
A14 Bionic +101%
2229
Score 1110 2229
Stability 99% 86%
Graphics test 6 FPS 13 FPS

PCMark 3.0

Benchmark for evaluating overall system performance in everyday workloads
PCMark 3.0
Web score 9557 -
Video editing score 5874 -
Data manipulation score 8658 -
Photo editing score 29642 -
Writing score 14782 -
Phones tested 14 models -

Gaming

Table of average FPS and graphics settings in mobile games
PUBG Mobile 60 FPS
[Ultra]
-
Call of Duty: Mobile 61 FPS
[Ultra]
-
Fortnite 30 FPS
[Ultra]
-
World of Tanks Blitz 60 FPS
[Ultra]
-
Genshin Impact 60 FPS
[Ultra]
-
Mobile Legends: Bang Bang 59 FPS
[Ultra]
-
Device Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro
1080 x 2340
-
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 865
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-19 (pong)AnTuTu 121115179
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-18 (Tarakane)AnTuTu 11933558
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-11 -> FenixistarkAnTuTu 121134088
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-05 (Gigante Supremo)AnTuTu 121111940
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-27 (MAPKIS)AnTuTu 121102560
Apple A14 Bionic
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-13 (Barelpunch)AnTuTu 111200682
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-12 (Z0tacxyz)AnTuTu 111294739
πŸ“˜ 2026-10-04 (Timur)AnTuTu 111199214
πŸ“˜ 2026-09-26 (kudryash)AnTuTu 111196958
πŸ“˜ 2026-08-04 (Stelle)AnTuTu 111288870

Specifications

Full list of technical specifications of Snapdragon 865 and A14 Bionic

CPU

Architecture 1x 2.84 GHz – Kryo 585 Prime (Cortex-A77)
3x 2.42 GHz – Kryo 585 Gold (Cortex-A77)
4x 1.8 GHz – Kryo 585 Silver (Cortex-A55)
2x 3.1 GHz – Firestorm
4x 1.8 GHz – Icestorm
Cores 8 6
Frequency 2840 MHz 3100 MHz
Instruction set ARMv8.2-A ARMv8.5-A
L1 cache 512 KB 128 KB
L2 cache 1 MB 8 MB
L3 cache 4 MB -
Process 7 nanometers 5 nanometers
Transistor count 10.3 billion 11.8 billion
TDP (Sustained Power Limit) 5 W 6 W
Manufacturing TSMC TSMC

Graphics

GPU name Adreno 650 Apple A14 GPU
Architecture Adreno 600 Apple Bionic GPU
GPU frequency 587 MHz 1278 MHz
Pipelines 3 4
Shading units 256 64
Total shaders 768 256
FLOPS 901.6 Gigaflops 654.3 Gigaflops
Vulkan version 1.1 -
OpenCL version 2.0 -
DirectX version 12.1 -

AI Accelerator

Neural processor (NPU) Hexagon 698 Apple Neural Engine
NPU theoretical performance - 11 TOPS

Memory

Memory type LPDDR5 LPDDR4X
Memory frequency 2750 MHz 2133 MHz
Bus 4x 16 Bit 4x 16 Bit
Max bandwidth 44 Gb/s 34.1 Gb/s
Max size 16 GB 6 GB

Multimedia (ISP)

Storage type UFS 3.0, UFS 3.1 NVMe
Max display resolution 3840 x 2160 2732 x 2048
Max camera resolution 1x 200MP, 2x 25MP -
Video capture 8K at 30FPS, 4K at 60FPS 4K at 60FPS
Video playback 8K at 30FPS, 4K at 60FPS 4K at 60FPS
Video codecs - H.264
- H.265
- VP8
- VP9
- H.264
- H.265
- 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 X55 -
4G support LTE Cat. 22 LTE Cat. 18
5G support Yes Yes
Download speed Up to 7500 Mbps Up to 7500 Mbps
Upload speed Up to 3000 Mbps Up to 2500 Mbps
Wi-Fi 6 6
Bluetooth 5.1 5.0
Navigation GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, QZSS, SBAS, NAVIC GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo

Info

Announced December 2019 September 2020
Class Flagship Flagship
Model number SM8250-AB APL1W01
Official page Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 official site -
Successor - Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 - Apple A19 Pro

Cast your vote

So, which SoC would you choose?
572 (45.2%)
694 (54.8%)
Total votes: 1266

Comments

Please give your opinion on the comparison of A14 Bionic and Snapdragon 865, or ask any questions
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Avatar
A14 monster April 28, 2023 at 10:34 PM
Even though everyone is basically worshipping A14 bionic right now, we can't deny the fact that Qualcomm made something good here with the snapdragon 865 staying relatively cool as compared to the A14 processor, I mean this thing heats up like my oven and I'll need to play heavy games directly under a fan or an air-conditioned environment and even so, it still heats up like its nobody's business.
+5 Reply
Avatar
865 favorite child April 29, 2023 at 07:48 PM
Even though the A14 bionic beat the crap out of the 865, I still think the Snapdragon 865 stayed relatively cooler than the A14 bionic. Lol
+4 Reply
Avatar
Lee July 8, 2021 at 06:40 AM
A14 is overprice. In fact Snapdragon 865, is running pretty close to neck to neck race. The A14 lead with a small margin only. So Snapdragon 865 price is value for money
+14 Reply
Avatar
mkay November 4, 2021 at 10:57 AM
β€œsmall margin” lol ..........
+5 Reply
Avatar
a Martin November 10, 2021 at 01:59 PM
mkay, Is +71% single core performance for the A14 ”small margin”? :D Even +18% in multicore performance for the A14 despite having to cores less than the 865. πŸ€·β€β™‚οΈ
+6 Reply
Avatar
A14 booty April 17, 2023 at 08:06 AM
mkay, πŸ˜… "small margin" I love the Snapdragon 865 because it stays relatively cool to the touch compared to the A14 processor and I see some stutters when in my user interface while using my iPhone 12.. however when provided with sufficient cooling, the A14 performance is unlike I've ever seen before.
+8 Reply