What’s the best Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 series chip? I tested them all to find out

The Snapdragon 8 series is Qualcomm’s top-tier of smartphone processors. These chips offer a ton of performance, blazing-fast connectivity, cutting-edge camera features, and loads of AI features. This family grew in a big way in 2026, though. And that’s before we talk about the brand new Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 series.

We already saw the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 and Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 in late 2025, but then we got the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy and the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5V. So, which one is best? Well, we’ve now tested phones with all of these Gen 5 chips. And we have an answer. For these tests, we used the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra, POCO F9 Ultra, POCO F9 Pro, and the OnePlus 15R.