Qualcomm unveiled the flagship Snapdragon 888 5G chipset earlier last month. It has been built on the 5nm process node and already powers devices like the Mi 11, Galaxy S21 series, and more. Now, Qualcomm is giving phone makers the arsenal to launch more affordable flagship phones in 2021. It has announced the Snapdragon 870 5G chipset today, which is essentially a minor upgrade over the Snapdragon 865.
The Snapdragon 865 is Qualcomm’s flagship chipset used in most flagship phones last year. We even got its souped-up version, the Snapdragon 865+, last year. It powered a lot of gaming phones in 2020. Now, Snapdragon 870 is essentially a souped-up version of the Snapdragon 865+. It can be seen as the Snapdragon 865++ for 2021.
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“Building upon the success of Snapdragon 865 and 865+, the new Snapdragon 870 was designed to address OEM and mobile industry requirements,” mentioned Kedar Kondap, VP, product management, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc in the official blog post. Well-known OEM partners, including Motorola, iQOO, OnePlus, OPPO, and Xiaomi, will launch phones powered by this chipset in the first quarter of 2021.
