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OnePlus announced via Weibo that the OnePlus 16 will debut in China on October 12, powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 chip featuring Matrix Core GPU technology. The company reiterated earlier-revealed specs including a 185Hz display, custom touch and Wi-Fi chips, and a camera system with a 200MP main sensor, 50MP 3x telephoto, and 50MP ultrawide lens.
Motorola is bringing its Signature 27 flagship phone to the US market, reportedly powered by a Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 chipset with an upgraded camera system and audio. Unlike some rivals, the phone will be sold through AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile stores along with several MVNOs, alongside trade-in and financing offers.
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.
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.
Android Authority ran Geekbench 6 tests on a reference phone powered by Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 chip, built on TSMC's 2nm process with prime CPU cores clocked up to 5GHz. Single-core performance rose about 10% over last year's Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, while multi-core gains were minimal at roughly 1.5% despite efficiency cores jumping to 4GHz.
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.
At its Snapdragon Summit in Maui, Qualcomm announced new processors for smartphones, laptops and wearables, including the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 and Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 flagship mobile chips. Alongside expected CPU and GPU gains, the chips feature an upgraded Hexagon NPU, a redesigned Sensing Hub and a new Element Accelerator built specifically to speed up agentic AI tasks.
Xiaomi has launched the Xiaomi 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, both featuring two 200MP Leica sensors alongside a 50MP ultrawide camera. The Pro Max runs on Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 with an 8,500mAh battery, while the Pro uses the standard 8 Elite Gen 6 chip with a 7,000mAh battery. Both models add a hardware privacy screen, a functional rear display, UWB support, IP69 water resistance, and a customizable AI button.
Qualcomm has unveiled two high-end mobile processors simultaneously, the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 and the Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6, both built on a new Oryon CPU revision with a 5GHz peak clock speed. The chips share the same X105 5G modem, FastConnect 8800 wireless module, imaging tools like Intelligent Pixel Control and Elite Color Engine, and a new Hexagon Element Accelerator for on-device AI, though some AI capabilities differ subtly between the two versions.
According to YouTuber Geekerwan, Qualcomm plans to enhance its official GPU drivers to better support PC game emulation on Android devices. Testing on a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 phone reportedly showed Cyberpunk 2077 and Black Myth: Wukong running properly in DirectX12 mode via a translation layer, and Qualcomm is said to be considering native DirectX12 driver support as well.
Qualcomm announced the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 and 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 mobile processors at its Snapdragon Summit, built on a 2nm process with dual 5GHz Oryon Prime cores. The chips bring notable CPU, GPU and NPU gains over the prior generation, alongside power efficiency improvements, and will ship in upcoming flagship phones from brands including Honor, Motorola, Oppo, Vivo and Xiaomi. Qualcomm emphasized AI agent capabilities, such as automated video sorting and location-based notifications, as the lineup's central feature.
Xiaomi launched the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max in China, adding a hardware-based privacy display that can be set to trigger by app, location or via selfie-camera detection of onlookers. Both phones keep the rear secondary screen from last year's models, pack two 200-megapixel cameras, and use Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 chips, with the Pro Max getting the higher-end Extreme variant and a larger 8,500mAh battery. Xiaomi says a global release will follow later this year.