For the past few years, MediaTek has been dominating in the midrange segment, with their Dimensity chips beating Qualcomm’s Snapdragon equivalent offerings at the under Php 20k and Php 30k price points. Qualcomm is trying to fight back strong with recent releases like the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 and Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 when it comes to midrange gaming.
The Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 has proven to be a redemption point for Qualcomm in the midrange gaming segment–does the same apply to the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 that’s found on phones like the realme 14 5G? We’ve been using the phone for a few weeks, and here are our findings:
An underclocked Snapdragon 7s Gen 3?
Just as the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 was an underclocked version of the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2, the same applies to the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4. It shares the same CPU, GPU, and 4nm TSMC process as the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3, with the only difference being the higher clock speeds for the Cortex-A720 cores and for the Adreno 810 GPU.
Corroborating to this claim, the CPU scores we got with the realme 14 5G’s Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 is close to Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 phones like the Nothing Phone 3(a). The same goes for GPU scores, with the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 getting a slightly higher score. As compared to the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3, the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 trails behind with GPU scores–and that’s expected since the former is marketed as an upper midrange chip.
Comparing it against equivalent MediaTek chips, the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 offers better CPU and GPU performance than the Dimensity 7300, and that shows that Qualcomm is staging a comeback in the midrange segment where MediaTek’s Dimensity chips are used more often.
Good for gaming?
Using the realme 14 5G to play Genshin Impact at high graphics with 60FPS enabled, our experience revealed that the fluidity of the game sits between what we experienced on phones running a Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 and a Snapdragon 7s Gen 2. In a nutshell, Genshin Impact felt smoother with the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 when compared to a similar device using a Snapdragon 7s Gen 2. One thing we noticed is that thermals on the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 is better than phones running the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3. Even with realme’s GT Mode enabled, the 14 5G felt cooler to the touch than what we experienced on the Redmi Note 14 Pro+.
The same can be said with Wuthering Waves, as the gameplay experience on the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 is close to that of the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3–with the main difference being the former handling thermals better.
Final thoughts
With the positive remarks we had for the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3, we can say the same with the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 as well. It’s a big performance improvement over Snapdragon 6 processors, and is now more usable with demanding games while running in high graphics settings.
It all boils down to pricing: the realme 14 5G is priced at Php 18k, while the most affordable Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 phone available in the Philippines will cost you around Php 20k. With Dimensity 7300-powered phones priced at under Php 15k lately, brands using the Snapdragon 6 Gen 4 should find ways to price their devices competitively.
