MediaTek Dimensity 9000: Overclocked version of the SoC aims to push its Cortex-X2 core to 3.2 GHz

It isn't out of character for Qualcomm to launch a mid-cycle refresh of its flagship mobile SoCs. This year's Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Plus has the potential to significantly outperform its non-Plus variant thanks to it using TSMC's fabs. A new leak from Weibo suggests that MediaTek could follow suit this time and that an overclocked version of the Dimensity 9000 (Dimensity 9000 Plus?) is being worked upon.

A purported Geekbench listing of the overclocked MediaTek Dimensity 9000 highlights disappointing performance (962/1,156 single/multi-core), and one can attribute that to the hardware still being worked upon. MediaTek plans to push the Cortex-X2 core on the new Dimensity 9000 variant  to 3.2 GHz (versus 3.0 GHz on the regular version). Everything else is pretty much identical across the board, including the codename and GPU. Incidentally, that also happens to be the target frequency Qualcomm has in mine for the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Plus.

A previous report said that pushing the Cortex X2 cores on the SD 8 Gen 1 Plus resulted in bad thermals. MediaTek is likely to run into the same problem with the overclocked Dimensity 9000, and it'll be interesting to see how it plans to keep the power draw in control. Unlike Qualcomm, MediaTek has a lot less stake here; it can continue using the TSMC-made Dimensity 9000 for the foreseeable future, while Qualcomm is racing against time to rid itself of Samsung LSI.

On paper, both the overclocked Dimensity 9000 and Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Plus share identical hardware. Their real-world performance will boil down to on-device optimizations, cooling solutions and a litany of factors. This is the closest MediaTek has come to snatching away the crown from Qualcomm, although both have a lot of catching up before they can dethrone Apple.

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