According to a report, both new Apple Watch models utilise the same underlying silicon as their predecessors. Unusually, Apple did not provide many details about its Apple S8 chipset during last week's Far Out launch event. So far, the company would only confirm that the Watch Ultra and Watch Series 8 rely on a 64-bit dual-core processor with 1.8 GHz CPU clock speeds, both complemented by 1 GB of RAM and 32 GB of flash storage.
However, @s1guza has noticed that the Watch Series 8, Watch Ultra and even the Watch SE 2 feature the CPID 'T8301', the same identifier found in the Watch Series 6 and Watch Series 7. In other words, this year's Apple Watch models are running the same chipsets from which many people may have upgraded. As MacRumors notes, the inclusion of identical chipsets may explain why Apple compared the Apple S8 against the Apple S5, rather than the Apple S6 or Apple S7.
Moreover, Apple has retained the W3 wireless chip, restricting its smartwatches to WiFi 4 connectivity. Conversely, Apple has upgraded the Watch Ultra to Bluetooth 5.3, although this upgrade does not extend to the Watch Series 8 for some reason. Ultimately, Apple is falling behind its Android competitors, which now have access to Snapdragon W5 Gen 1 and Snapdragon W5 Gen Plus 1 platforms. In saying that, Samsung has just released the Galaxy Watch5 series with the same chipset as its predecessors, while Google is on the verge of announcing the Pixel Watch with an SoC derived from the Exynos 9110, which Samsung unveiled in 2018.