The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra's new chip may not just offer more power, but also an incredible enhancement to power efficiency, so says the latest leak from the reliable Ice Universe.
His newest claim comes from a comparison between benchmarks for the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, taken from a Vivo phone apparently using the newly-released chip, and those for a European Galaxy S22 Ultra running an Exynos 2200 chipset. Not only is the power increase on the Geekbench 5 CPU tests plain to see, but IU then adds that compared to the Exynos 2200's GPU, the new Snapdragon silicon will make the top Galaxy S23 model 60% more powerful and as much as 88% more energy efficient than its Exynos predecessor. Granted the GPU is only one part of the whole chip, but a near 90% increase sounds incredible.
For Exynos2200 users in Europe, the update from S22U to S23U is an earth shaking change. The multi-core increase of 45% is enough to make you feel faster in daily operation, not just in the score. pic.twitter.com/4cRCutwILdNovember 22, 2022
The Galaxy S22 Ultra's battery life wasn't too impressive when we tested it earlier this year. It lasted 9 hours and 50 minutes on our custom battery test when the best phone battery life contenders all manage 11 hours or more. If the Galaxy S23 Ultra is as efficient as IU is suggesting, we have high hopes for the new phone on our test, even if its battery is allegedly no larger than the S22 Ultra's.
We've seen from previous leaks how much more power the Galaxy S23's new Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip can provide — more than an iPhone 14 in some cases. But keep in mind though that the comparison that Ice Universe's drawing may not be fully valid. Some rumors have claimed Samsung will get its own higher-spec version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, which could have different power level and energy consumption characteristics to the regular version we already know about.
Comparing the new Snapdragon chip with the old Exynos one is an important difference for potential Galaxy S23 buyers in Europe. While many Galaxy S phones are sold with Snapdragon chips, those sold in Europe have historically used Samsung's own Exynos chips, which have proven to be less powerful in benchmarks.
With the rumor mill suggesting that Samsung could possibly use Snapdragon chips in the Galaxy S23 worldwide, it could mean the perceivable performance jump between generations might be even larger for European buyers than it already seems it'll be for American customers. U.K. Samsung fans and others on the mainland will no doubt also be happy to finally get offered a phone that's just as good as what American users get.
Other rumored changes for the Galaxy S23 Ultra are a new 200MP main camera to replace the S22 Ultra's 108MP unit, and a slightly reworked design with flatter edges. As for the basic Galaxy S23 and Galaxy S23 Plus, they will apparently be getting a bigger design rework to bring them in line with the look of the Galaxy S22 Ultra and S23 Ultra, as well as new selfie cameras with a higher-res 12MP sensor. We'll only know for sure when these phones launch though, which is tipped to be between January and March of 2023.
