In October, Qualcomm took the wraps off its Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 system on a chip (SoC) and now the company has officially announced the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 SoC. The first devices with this new SoC will arrive by the end of November with Honor and Vivo specified as two manufacturers that will use it.

An SoC With Lots of AI

On-device AI plays a big part in this new chip. Qualcomm says the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 will be able to recognize activities to provide more useful experiences. For example, the SoC could automatically understand that you are working out and ask you if you would like to activate fitness tracking.

This SoC will also be able to use AI tricks for improved photography and video. The AI Remosiac feature can remove grainy discoloration on images, while AI Noise Reduction helps clean up images even when the subject is in low light. The Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 also has three image signal processors (ISPs), which lets it capture image data from three cameras at once. Qualcomm says the SoC can produce 4K HDR video with improved sharpness and contrast.

Offline translation of multiple languages and transcriptions are also made possible by the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3. We have seen this kind of feature excel on Google's Tensor chips, so we will have to see how well the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 compares.

Plenty of Power

The Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 has a peak CPU speed of 2.63GHz, which Qualcomm says is nearly a 15% improvement in CPU speeds when compared to the Snapdragon 7 Gen 1. The Gen 3 features 8 cores: one Prime core up to 2.63GHz, three performance cores up to 2.4GHz, and four efficiency cores up to 1.8GHz.

You may have noticed that Qualcomm compared the Gen 3 to the Gen 1. However, Qualcomm also offers the Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 and it tops out at 2.91GHz, so the Gen 3's top clock speed is a little slower than the Gen 2.

As for the GPU, the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 features one that is more than 50% faster than the Gen 1 and should help display HDR graphics. It can also power displays capable of showing up to 144fps.

A 5G modem is also onboard this SoC and it supports 5G mmWave, sub-6 GHz, and can handle download speeds up to 5Gbps; the Gen 1 and Gen 2 both maxed out at 4.4Gbps. For Wi-Fi, the Gen 3 can support Wi-Fi 6E up to 2.9Gbps.

Qualcomm says the Gen 3 is 20% more power efficient than the Gen 1 and the Quick Charge 5 tech will let a device go from 0% to 50% charged in just five minutes.

Audio Improvements

LE Audio with Auracast support is on the Gen 3 and it lets devices like phones to broadcast audio to an unlimited number of receivers (speakers, earbuds, hearing devices). That means that if you want to share a song with a friend, there would be no need to loan them one of your earbuds. Instead, your Snapdragon 7 Gen 3-powered device could let multiple sets of headphones tune in (assuming they are compatible, of course). For those of you who like to feel like they are a part of the action, the Gen 3 can handle spatial audio along with head tracking.

Considering the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 will power many of the flagships of 2024, we expect to see the Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 arrive in phones that may be less expensive than the top-of-the-line models using the more powerful 8 Gen 3.