Every smartphone worth its name in 2016 has shipped with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820 processor.
The chip, announced last year, has, according to its maker, been used in 115 top-of-the-range smartphones so far. Examples include Xiaomi’s flagship smartphone, the Mi5, HTC’s 10, LG’s G5 and Samsung’s Galaxy S7.
To keep the momentum the 820 has gained after last year’s much-maligned Snapdragon 810, Qualcomm has today announced a newer iteration, the Snapdragon 821. According to the company, the Snapdragon 821 is not meant to replace the 820 but rather to complement it and power the next generation of premium smartphones.
Rather than replace the Snapdragon 820, the 821 is designed to complement and extend the competitive strengths of our Snapdragon 800 lineup
The 820 is well known for faster performance, less heat dissipation and integration with the latest network technologies. This is where the 821 picks up from. According to Qualcomm, the Snapdragon 821’s performance is better than the 820 by 10%.
The chip will arrive with ready support for virtual reality which, thanks to Google’s Android Daydream is now going to be a feature every high-end smartphone must support out of the box.
Devices packing the Snapdragon 821 are expected to start arriving as early as this second half of 2016. The next Nexus smartphone(s) from Google may be?
