‘Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro’ needed more words to prove its power, three other flagship chips coming

Ben Schoon | Jun 26 2026 - 6:05 am PT

Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chipset lineup is eternally confusing, with slight variations generating new names and options that aren’t all that different. But it sounds like the next few releases are going to be especially confusing, with several new chips in the works including the “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro.”

Yes, Qualcomm is adding yet another word to describe how powerful its flagship chip for Android phones is. “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro” tacks on that “Pro” moniker to what was already a mouthful in the “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5.”

Digital Chat Station on Weibo reports that it earns that new name with “record-breaking peak performance” derived from a 2+3+3 Oryon core configuration, “more aggressive” clock speeds, a new A850 GPU, 16GB GMEM, and support for LPDDR6/5X memory. It would also be built on a 2nm process.

But that chip, SM8975, isn’t the only one in the pipeline.

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The report goes on to detail three other chips, including “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6” and “Snapdragon 8 Gen 6” – apparently Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 and Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 wasn’t a confusing-enough situation. Differences on the standard “Elite Gen 6” would include a step-down GPU, no LPDDR6 support, and 12GB GMEM, while using the same 2+3+3 core configuration.

There would also be a new variant of the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 releasing under the “SM8850Q” designation, and an SM8845 Pro chip that might either be “Snapdragon 8 Gen 6” or “Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 Pro.”

So, to recap, Qualcomm’s upcoming lineup of flagship-tier Snapdragon chips includes:

SM8975 – 2nm “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro”
SM8950 – 2nm “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6”
SM8850Q – 3nm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 variant
SM8845 Pro – 3nm “Snapdragon 8 Gen 6” or “Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 Pro”

Perfectly not confusing.

If Qualcomm’s usual timeline holds, we’ll likely start seeing these chips in the next few months, with the first flagships on “Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro” landing around October/November/December.