As part of its mid-year update, Qualcomm announced the Snapdragon 888+ at MWC. While it is practically similar to the vanilla version, the Snapdragon 888+ upgrades on two aspects: the Cortex-X1-based Kryo 680 prime core and the AI engine.

for the prime core, Qualcomm managed to squeeze more power on the Cortex-X1-based Kryo 680 with a clock speed of 3Ghz–that is higher than the 2.84Ghz clock speed on the same core found on the vanilla Snapdragon 888. Another key change is the AI engine, as the Snapdragon 888+ uses an improved Hexagon 780 AI processor that can do 32 TOPS (vs 26TOPS on the vanilla Snapdragon 888). While it is not the GPU upgrade we would expect, the AI engine upgrade should deliver as high as 20% better performance for AI-related tasks.

Save for those two key differences, the Snapdragon 888+ is still manufactured using the same 5nm process–not 4nm as initially rumored. Other similarities include an Adreno 660 GPU, Spectra 580 DSP, Snapdragon X60 5G modem, and FastConnect 6900.

As for availability, Asus, Motorola, Xiaomi, and vivo have confirmed to have phones with the Snapdragon 888+, which should launch sometime Q3 of 2021. Aside from the brands mentioned, HONOR President for Product Line Fang Fei also confirmed that Qualcomm’s latest flagship processor is coming to the Magic3 series. That is a big announcement for HONOR, as the now-independent brand has access to the latest Qualcomm processors after it has left parent company Huawei.

Aside from the Snapdragon 888+, Qualcomm also announced that the Snapdragon X65 5G modem will be available to more products, and that it has Xiaomi and OPPO to release one of the first phones with the mmWave-supported 5G modem by the end of this year.