Dimensity 9500s vs. Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5: Smartphone Performance and Prices

The MediaTek Dimensity 9500s and Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 are powerful mobile SoCs, but smartphones based on them differ noticeably in price. The Snapdragon is faster in CPU tests and most demanding graphics benchmarks. The Dimensity 9500s falls behind in performance, but the POCO X8 Pro Max with this chip launched at $469, compared with $649 for the Snapdragon-powered Nubia Z80 Ultra.

The Main Difference Between the Two Platforms

The Dimensity 9500s uses a configuration without small efficiency cores: one Cortex-X925 clocked at up to 3.73 GHz, three Cortex-X4 cores, and four Cortex-A720 cores.

The Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 is built around Qualcomm’s proprietary Oryon cores. In most devices, the clock speed reaches 4.6 GHz, while some versions run at up to 4.74 GHz.

Snapdragon Is Faster in CPU Tests

In Geekbench 6, the Nubia Z80 Ultra is 31% faster than the POCO X8 Pro Max in Single-Core and 23% faster in Multi-Core.

In AnTuTu 11, the gap is around 30%: approximately 3.94 million points for the Nubia Z80 Ultra versus 3.03 million for the POCO X8 Pro Max.

The Redmi Turbo 5 Max with the Dimensity 9500s scores around 2.9-3.1 million points in AnTuTu 11 and more than 9000 points in Geekbench 6 Multi-Core. The results from the second smartphone confirm that the POCO X8 Pro Max’s figures are not an isolated case.

Adreno 840 Is Faster in Newer Graphics Tests

The Immortalis-G925 supports hardware ray tracing, but falls behind the Adreno 840 in Steel Nomad Light and Solar Bay.

In Steel Nomad Light, the Snapdragon is approximately 35% faster; in Solar Bay, it is approximately 29% faster.

Wild Life Extreme does not follow this trend: the POCO X8 Pro Max slightly outperforms the Xiaomi 17. The result is affected by power limits, cooling, and the settings of the specific smartphone.

Smartphones and Prices

In this selection, the most affordable Snapdragon smartphone costs $649-$180 more than the POCO X8 Pro Max and more than twice the price of the Chinese Redmi Turbo 5 Max.

A smartphone’s price depends on more than just its SoC: cameras, the display, memory capacity, and the cooling system also affect it. Among the models considered, devices with the Dimensity 9500s are noticeably cheaper.

Conclusion

The Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 is faster in Geekbench 6, Steel Nomad Light, and Solar Bay, with the gap reaching 30-35% in some tests.

The Dimensity 9500s falls behind in performance, but devices based on it are noticeably cheaper in our selection: the POCO X8 Pro Max launched at $469, compared with $649 for the Nubia Z80 Ultra.