Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 vs Samsung Exynos 9810 vs Samsung Exynos 9825

Qualcomm Snapdragon 845

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 Mobile Platform (or SD845) is a high-end SoC for smartphones that was introduced in early 2018 and manufactured in 10 nm LPP FinFET at TSMC. Integrates 4x Kryo 385 cores (Cortex-A75) at up to 2.8 GHz (max) for performance and 4x Kryo 385 at 1.8 GHz (max) for efficiency. Furthermore offers an X20 LTE modem (Cat. 18 1.2 Gbps downlink, Cat 13 150 Mbps uplink), ac-WiFi and a dual-channel 32-Bit 1866 MHz LPDDR4x memory controller.

Samsung Exynos 9810

The Samsung Exynos 9 9810 is a mobile SoC for smartphones and tablets. It was announced early 2018 and should be integrated in the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S9 series (at least partly). It integrates eight CPU cores (octa core) in two clusters. The performance cluster integrates four Samsung M3 at 2.9 GHz and the power efficiency cluster four small ARM Cortex-A55 cores at 1.9 GHz. The Samsung M3 cores are based on Samsungs own design and now offer a wider pipeline, improved cache memory and bigger caches. This leads to a twice as fast single-core performance and a 40 percent improved multi-core performance according to Samsung (most likely compared to the previous Exynos 8898).

The integrated LTE modem also got a siginifcant upgrade and now supports Cat.18/13 LTE for up to 1.2 Gbps download and 200 Mbps upload. This is achieved with 6x20 MHz CA, 256-QAM in download and 2x20 MHz in upload.

As a GPU, Samsung integrates a ARM Mali G72MP18 (only 18 clusters, compared to the 20 clusters of the predecessor G71MP20). Most likely Samsung increases performance due to a higher core clock of the graphics card.

The memory controller looks similar to the 8898 and supports LPDDR4x 1800 MHz. The video engine now also supports 10 bit videos (as before 4k120 H.265/HEVC, H.264 and VP9 de- and encoding). 

The SoC is produced at Samsung in the new 10nm LPP process (the Exynos 8898 still used the 10nm LPE process) that should also help with some of the performance gains.

Samsung Exynos 9825

The Samsung Exynos 9 9825 is a mobile SoC for smartphones and tablets. It was announced in the Samsung Note 10 line in August 2019. The processor integrates three clusters of processor cores with different architectures. Two big Samsung custom M4 cores clock up to 2.73 GHz and deliver peak performance. Two additional ARM Cortex-A75 are also for performance tasks and clock at up to 2.4 GHz (up from 2.3 GHz in the 9820). Finally, four small and power efficient ARM-Cortex A55 cores clock at up to 1.9 GHz are in the third cluster. The different clusters can run simultaneously thanks to DinamIQ.

The integrated LTE modem supports LTE-Advanced Pro Cat.20 (8CA 2 Gbps download, 3CA 316 Mbps upload). The integrated graphics card is a ARM Mali G76MP12 with 12 cores. Thanks to higher clock rates, the G76 is now a bit faster compared to the Exynos 9820.

The performance of the CPU part is positioned in the high end segment for smartphone processors. Due to the slight changes in clock rates, it is very comparable to the older Eynos 9 9820. Maybe in longer load phases, the improved 7nm process helps to maintain clock speeds a bit better. The direct competitor Snapdragon 855 can be left behind in single-core benchmarks like Geekbench and operates on par in multi-core benchmarks.

The SoC is produced at Samsung in the new 7nm LPP (with EUV) process that should improve power efficiency compared to the Exynos 9820.