If the performance advantage of the iPhone cannot be maintained, how much impact will it have on Apple?

Last week, Qualcomm released its latest Snapdragon processor, the Snapdragon 8Gen3. Although the processor did not adopt the latest 3-nanometer process technology this time, with the mature 4-nanometer process, the new chip has significantly improved computational performance, technical characteristics, algorithms, and applications. Qualcomm's efforts are indeed commendable.

After the press conference, it is inevitable that people will compare the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8Gen3 with Apple's A17Pro to determine who is the most powerful mobile SoC, which is very curious. At present, the main data comparison for these two processors has appeared, let's take a look together!

According to test data from Geek Bay, the CPU performance of Snapdragon 8Gen3 in Geekbench5 is divided into single core 1693 and multi core 6782. The A17Pro has a single core score of 2167 and a multi core score of 6342. Overall, the Snapdragon 8Gen3's single core performance is 22% weaker than A17Pro, but its multi-core performance is 7% stronger.

The performance of the CPU directly affects the smoothness of the phone. From the test results, it can be seen that the overall CPU performance of Snapdragon 8Gen3 is still inferior to that of A17Pro. However, it is worth noting that the previous generation Snapdragon 8Gen lags behind A16 in all aspects, while this time Snapdragon 8Gen3 has already achieved anti surpassing in multi-core performance, indicating that the gap between the two is narrowing.

The Adreno750GPU used by Snapdragon 8Gen3 showed a score of 280FPS in the Manhattan 3.1 test in GFX testing. Compared to Snapdragon 8Gen2, it has increased by 24.4%, and compared to A17Pro, it has increased by 37%, showing a clear leading advantage.

But what is even more surprising is its energy efficiency performance. Although people had originally expected it to be a high power consuming processor, according to the test results of the energy efficiency curve, the Snapdragon 8Gen3 showed significant performance improvement while its power consumption fluctuated only between 8W and 9W. In contrast, even though the power consumption of the A17Pro is close to 12W, it is much higher than the Snapdragon 8Gen3.

Therefore, from the perspective of GPU performance, it is evident that Snapdragon 8Gen3 has completely crushed the A17Pro, mainly due to significant improvements in its GPU architecture.

Overall, although Snapdragon 8Gen3 does not perform as well as A17Pro in terms of CPU performance, it completely surpasses its competitors in terms of GPU and has better power consumption control. Therefore, it is no exaggeration to say that the Snapdragon 8Gen3 is more powerful than the A17Pro.

At present, the first batch of models equipped with Snapdragon 8Gen3 processors have been unveiled, including the Xiaomi 14 series. At the same time, many Android flagship models are about to be released. Therefore, some people are beginning to question: Apple is currently unable to maintain the performance advantage of the A-series chips, will this not lead consumers to no longer purchase Apple's products? I think the situation may not be as bad as people think about it.

The main reason is that Apple's audience does not actually place too much emphasis on performance. Even when previous generations of A-series chips shone brightly, Apple has been using a double-layer motherboard design since the iPhone X, without focusing on cooling issues. Even chips with excellent performance can only remind users that their phones are severely heated and cannot fully utilize their advantages.

Therefore, regardless of the past claims of Apple's strong or poor performance, the problem seems not significant. From iPhone X to the latest iPhone 15, there have been several generations of updates, and despite continuous criticism, consumers are still making purchases. This can only indicate that Apple's user base is not a follower focused on performance.

In addition, the performance of mobile phones is currently in a surplus stage, and even if the performance has been improved by a certain amount, the perception of users is not obvious, and it is basically just a change in paper data. And I think Apple's strengths lie in its ecosystem, video recording capabilities, and user loyalty.

Apple's ecosystem has always performed well, especially its iOS system, with impeccable smoothness and security. As for video recording, it may be something that many people have not noticed, and currently Apple has almost no competitors in this field. In addition, Apple has also launched a special feature for external video recording this year, clearly considering the needs of professionals. And regarding user loyalty, it goes without saying much. How many people would easily agree to persuade their friends who use Apple to switch to Android now?

Therefore, the significant progress of Snapdragon 8Gen3 does exist, but for Apple, its impact may not be too significant. However, Apple should also carefully examine itself, whether it can keep up with the pace of the surrounding times? If we can keep up, why not follow?