Qualcomm announces Snapdragon 855 chip for 2019 Android phones

A new generation of smartphones is nearly upon us.

Starting in 2019, Android phone makers will start shipping new devices with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 855 system-on-a-chip (SoC), which’ll be the first chip to support 5G. That’s right, mobile 5G — which has been mostly company promises and marketing hype up to this point — is now a step closer to being something you can hold in your hand.

In a meeting in advance of the announcement, Qualcomm Senior Vice President and General Manager of Mobile Alex Katouzian was light on specific details about how much faster the Snapdragon 855 is compared to the current Snapdragon 845.

Katouzian also didn’t share with me any stats on how the new chip stacks up to Apple’s industry-leading A12 Bionic and A12X Bionic chips found in the iPhone XR, XS, and XS Max and new iPad Pros, respectively.

More details on the the 855 will be forthcoming on Dec. 5, the second day of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Technology Summit in Hawaii, but for now here’s what we know about the chip and what it could mean for your next phone.

1. 5G phones coming soon

Phone makers who choose to use the 855 chip in their devices will have support for 5G out of the gate. That depends, of course, on the particular carrier network you want to connect to and whether the phone’s manufacturer has enabled the modem. You may need to wait for network availability, and it may take a firmware update after that, but the capability will be there.

At the Summit, Cristiano Amon, president of Qualcomm, announced the chip would support “multi-gigabit connectivity” consisting of 5G, 4G LTE, and WiFi.

Presumably, the chip will integrate Qualcomm’s previously announced X50 modem in order to achieve 5G data speeds or include the X24 LTE modem to get download speeds of up to 2 Gbps.

Ahead of the Summit, Samsung and Verizon announced they’ll show off a concept 5G phone this week. 

2. Faster AI and mixed reality performance

Injecting AI in more places in phones has been an ongoing trend for a few years and Qualcomm has tripled the AI performance with the 855 chip, at least on paper.

Qualcomm says the 855’s four-generation multi-core AI Engine offers up to three times the AI performance compared to the AI Engine on the 845.

A more powerful AI Engine should improve everything from advanced camera features (like object and scene detection or processing depth-of-field for portrait mode photos) to making digital assistants more responsive, and more.

The improved AI engine will also improve augmented- and mixed-reality experiences, further blurring the lines between the real and the digital.

3. Built-in computer vision

The future of mobile photography and video capture isn’t just about cramming in more megapixels or more lenses (although it’s certainly one way forward for some phone makers). Instead, it’s looking more and more like computational photography, which leverages AI and machine learning to achieve photos and videos not possible hardware alone, is the way forward.

Google was quick to pioneer computational photography with the Pixel 2, using machine-learning techniques to produce portrait photos with blurred backgrounds without the need for a second camera. Apple followed this year, leaning on the A12 Bionic’s Neural Engine in the iPhone XR to achieve the same (albeit only for people shots).

The Pixel 3 took computational photography to the next level with Night Sight, a mode that takes night shots and literally turns them into photos that look like they were shot during the day.

With the 855, Qualcomm says the chip is the first with a CV ISP (computer vision image signal processor) that’ll enable “cutting-edge computation photography and video capture features.” What exactly that means is unclear. Perhaps portrait mode or Night Sight-like modes for video? That would really be something! Hopefully, we’ll learn more soon.

4. Snapdragon Elite Gaming

Mobile gaming (especially in Asia) continues to grow like there’s no tomorrow and with more people playing performance-taxing games like Fortnite on their phones and more companies releasing gaming-centric phones, it’s no wonder Qualcomm’s putting more eggs into improving the experience.

We don’t know what exactly the “Snapdragon Elite Gaming” features cover, but safe bets probably include faster GPU performance with less power draw and better heat management from ramping up the 855’s clockspeed.

Ultimately, mobile games running on the 855 will likely look even better with richer details (graphics always get better year over year) and play smoother with smoother frame rates.

5. More accurate in-display fingerprint sensor

A good number of Chinese phone makers made the risky jump to include in-display fingerprint sensors in their phones. The OnePlus 6T and Huawei Mate 20 Pro are two phones with the fastest and most responsive sensors.

But these optical in-display fingerprint sensors still aren’t on par with a physical sensor like Touch ID on some iPhones and the Pixel Imprint on the Pixel 3.

Qualcomm wants to change that with its “3D Sonic Sensor.” Instead of shining a light from underneath the display to illuminate your fingerprint for authentication, the sensor uses ultrasound.

The chipmaker says the sensor is a marked improvement over current optical in-display sensors because it’s more accurate and more secure, enables thinner designs, and works even if your fingers are dirty or wet.

It sounds great, but we’ll reserve judgement for when phones ship with these sensors.

We’ll have lots more to day about the Snapdragon 855, Qualcomm, and 5G in the coming days.