Qualcomm today unveiled the Snapdragon 8 Elite mobile platform, which features a next-generation custom Qualcomm-designed Oryon CPU instead of the semi-custom Kryo Arm-based chips from prior SoCs. According to Qualcomm, the Snapdragon 8 Elite features the "world's fastest mobile CPU," outperforming even the A18 Pro chip in the iPhone 16 Pro series.
The Oryon CPU is built on a 3-nanometer process, much like Apple's most recent chips. It has eight cores in total, including two prime cores and six performance cores, and it is able to reach peak CPU speeds of 4.32 GHz. Qualcomm also claims that it has the "industry's largest shared cache" to enable "insanely fast data retrieval." There's also a new "Adreno" GPU, and Qualcomm says it uses a "revolutionary sliced architecture" for faster performance and battery life optimizations.
Qualcomm built the chip with generative AI in mind, and it has an included Qualcomm AI Engine with Multimodal Gen AI that Qualcomm says can better understand voice, text, and images, viewing the world through the camera on a smartphone to help with tasks.
Compared to prior-generation Qualcomm chips, the Snapdragon 8 Elite features 45 percent faster CPU performance and 44 percent better power efficiency.
The chip integrates the Qualcomm Snapdragon X80 5G modem with Wi-Fi 7 and 5G support. It will be used in Android-based devices from companies like Google, Samsung, OnePlus, Xiaomi, and more.
Wednesday January 14, 2026 10:18 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Verizon is experiencing a major outage across the U.S. today, with hundreds of thousands of customers reporting issues with the network on the website Downdetector. There are also complaints across Reddit and other social media platforms.
iPhone users and others with Verizon service are generally unable to make phone calls, send text messages, or use data over 5G or LTE due to the outage....
Wednesday January 14, 2026 7:09 am PST by Joe Rossignol
While the iPhone 18 Pro models are still around eight months away, a leaker has shared some alleged details about the devices.
In a post on Chinese social media platform Weibo this week, the account Digital Chat Station said the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max will have the same 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes as the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max.
Consistent with previous...
Thursday January 15, 2026 10:56 am PST by Joe Rossignol
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another eight months, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices.
Below, we have recapped 12 features rumored for the iPhone 18 Pro models, as of January 2026:
The same overall design is expected, with 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes, and a "plateau" housing three rear cameras
Under-screen Face ID...
Thursday January 15, 2026 11:19 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple today updated its trade-in values for select iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch models. Trade-ins can be completed on Apple's website, or at an Apple Store.
The charts below provide an overview of Apple's current and previous trade-in values in the United States, according to the company's website. Most of the values declined slightly, but some of the Mac values increased.
iPhone
...
Tuesday January 13, 2026 7:52 pm PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple and Google this week announced that Gemini will help power a more personalized Siri, and The Information has provided more details.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.
As soon as this spring, the report said the revamped version of Siri will be able to…
Answer more factual/world knowledge questions in a conversational manner
Tell more stories
Provide...
Is the claim 'fastest clock speed' or 'fastest when we put eleventy billion cores against one Apple core'?
Their footnote says compared to a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, and a 45% ST improvement would put them at 3,101. A18 Pro is 3350ish. That's wouldn't be the fastest so it sounds like more Qualcomm bullcrap.
Multithread would be about 9,690 compared to 8,080ish, but that's with eight cores to six...so again, not an even comparison, but not a surprise from Qualcomm.
And their launch partners are mostly known benchmark cheaters, so I hope the testers take that into account.
If all of this is true, we knew it was a matter of time that the competition would catch up. Even Intel is making great strides with moving x86 closer to ARM (although they're still quite a ways off). Apple Silicon truly revolutionized the industry, and Apple should get a lot of credit for it. Although I'm quite critical of Apple in a lot of aspects, the M3 15" MacBook Air is the best laptop I've ever owned, and in my opinion the best laptop ever built.
