Qualcomm Snapdragon 675 Targets Mid-Range Phones With Beefy AI Engine And Triple-Camera Support

The Snapdragon 675 is an octa-core design featuring two high-performance, fourth-generation Kryo cores operating at 2GHz along with six Kryo efficiency cores clocked at 1.7GHz. Compared to the Snapdragon 670, Qualcomm says that the Snapdragon 675 improves game launches by 30 percent, boosts web browsing by 35 percent and makes opening up music files and social media content faster as well.

During our pre-briefing on the SoC, it was revealed that the Snapdragon 675 isn't built on a 10nm process like the Snapdragon 845, but instead on Samsung's 11nm LPP manufacturing node. This is a hybrid node that combines the elements of both Samsung's 10nm and 14nm LPP offerings. When Samsung first announced its 11LPP process over a year ago, it said that it would offer a 15 percent performance uplift and a 10 percent area reduction compared to 14LPP.

The Snapdragon 675 features a sixth-generation Adreno GPU, and that it will support up to FHD+ displays. We don't expect any major boosts in performance on this front, as Qualcomm made no mention of relative gaming performance. The company did say that with respect to gaming, the Snapdragon 675 provides up to 90 percent fewer janks. Qualcomm simply says that this refers to "gaming enhancements" that allow for faster frame rates, smoother gameplay and fewer missed frames.

On the connectivity side, the Snapdragon 675 integrates a Snapdragon X12 Cat 12 modem which supports downlink speeds of up 600Mbps. When it comes to cameras, the SoC can support up to three (telephone, wide-angle, super-wide angle). As we've seen over the past year, the number of smartphone feature triple rear cameras is rising, and the Snapdragon 675 will enable this perk at more affordable prices. 

Finally, the Snapdragon 675 incorporates a multi-core AI engine that is said to improve AI performance in applications by up to 50 percent. The AI engine is capable of augmenting captured images and video, provides low-power support for voice assistants like Alexa and the Google Assistant, augments biometric features like face unlock, and helps to optimize battery life.

Qualcomm says that the Snapdragon 675 Mobile Platform is available now for its customers, and will arrive in consumer devices starting in Q1 2019.