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Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 lacks High Performance Memory, certain video codecs, and Matrix cores for AI graphics that were present on last year's Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. These capabilities are instead reserved for the pricier Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6, which also gets 50% more local memory for on-device AI models than the standard Gen 6.
Microsoft's newly announced Surface Pro (2nd Edition) and Surface Laptop (2nd Edition) meet all technical specs for the Copilot+ PC label but aren't marketed under that name, according to Surface VP Brett Ostrum. Both machines use Qualcomm Snapdragon X2 Plus chips with an 80 TOPS NPU, well above the 40 TOPS threshold Microsoft originally set for the category. Microsoft's Copilot+ PC marketing page has also been quietly replaced with one for 'performance PCs.'
Microsoft and Qualcomm confirmed at the Snapdragon 2026 Summit that they will no longer market new Surface and Snapdragon-powered PCs as 'Copilot+' devices, even though the underlying AI features remain unchanged. Surface VP Brett Ostrum and Qualcomm's Kedar Kondap both told Windows Central the companies still emphasize AI capabilities, just without the Copilot+ label that debuted with Arm-based Windows PCs in 2024.
Qualcomm announced it has renewed its global patent licensing agreement with Apple, with the new terms taking effect April 1, 2027. The current agreement, originally signed in 2019 after the two companies settled years of litigation, had been extended once before and was due to expire in March 2027.
Microsoft's new 12-inch Surface Pro and 13-inch Surface Laptop meet the technical specs for Copilot Plus PCs but are not being marketed under that name, Surface CVP Brett Ostrom confirmed to Windows Central. Qualcomm's Kedar Kondap indicated similar devices will likely drop the branding going forward too.
Qualcomm has unveiled the Snapdragon Sound Elite Gen 2, its first audio chip with micro-power Wi-Fi 6E built directly into the silicon, allowing earbuds to connect to home networks without a separate Wi-Fi chip. The company says the chip is 30 percent smaller, uses up to 40 percent less power, and doubles AI processing versus its predecessor. Qualcomm has named HP, Bose, and Cleer as partners, including camera-equipped earbuds with Cleer.
PrismML, an AI lab founded by Caltech researchers and advised by UC Berkeley's Ion Stoica, unveiled a version of its 1-bit Bonsai language model built for Qualcomm's Snapdragon AR1 Gen 1 platform, shown at Qualcomm's Snapdragon Summit. The 2-billion-parameter model is tuned to handle vision and language tasks locally on smart glasses, letting wearers query what they see in real time. No specific glasses using the model have been announced yet.
Microsoft is refreshing its smaller Surface Pro and Surface Laptop with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X2 Plus chip, launching October 13. The devices keep last year's design but get 16GB minimum RAM (up from 8GB), brighter screens, and modest battery life gains. Starting prices jump to $1,149.99 for the Surface Pro and $1,199.99 for the Surface Laptop, up from $799.99 and $899.99 respectively.
Xiaomi unveiled its 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max phones in China, among the first devices to run Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 chipset, with the Pro Max using the higher-end variant. Both phones feature privacy screens that limit off-angle viewing, LTPO AMOLED displays up to 6.9 inches with 4,000 nits peak brightness, the same triple rear camera setup as before, and larger batteries of 7,000mAh and 8,500mAh respectively.
Qualcomm has introduced the Snapdragon Sound Elite Gen 2, a chip aimed at powering next-generation earbuds, headphones and audio glasses with on-device AI. The company says it doubles the AI processing capability of its predecessor, the Snapdragon S7 Gen 1 Sound Platform, and supports features like real-time translation and sound amplification for hearing-impaired users. The chip also includes aptX Lossless audio support, Qualcomm's XPAN wireless technology, and Wi-Fi 6E connectivity.
Qualcomm announced that its Snapdragon X2 Series processors, which include an NPU capable of 80 trillion operations per second, will gain official Linux support. The company is upstreaming core drivers, including for the Hexagon NPU and Adreno GPU, starting with Debian by the end of this year and Ubuntu certification targeted for the first half of 2027 through a partnership with Canonical. Partners HP, ASUS and HUMAIN are also planning Linux-supported devices in early 2027, with current work validated on a Debian 13 'Trixie' environment.
Xiaomi unveiled the Xiaomi 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max in Beijing, making it the first manufacturer to ship phones with Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 and 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 chips. Both models retain a secondary rear OLED display next to the camera module, which shows notifications and widgets and lets users take selfies with the higher-quality rear cameras. The phones launch first in China, with a global rollout planned before the end of 2026, though Xiaomi devices continue to bypass the US market.