Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 phones: benchmarks, gaming & which to buy
What the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 delivers in real phones: benchmark scores, gaming performance, battery efficiency and the phones that ship with it.
What the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 is
Qualcomm's 2022 flagship — the chip that repaired the 8 Gen 1's reputation. Built on TSMC 4 nm instead of Samsung's troubled node, it ranks #19 of 79 in our catalog: AnTuTu about 1.76 million, Geekbench 6 near 2,000 single-core and 5,300 multi-core. Samsung trusted it worldwide for the Galaxy S23 generation, and it also powered the Z Flip 5, Z Fold 5 and Honor's Magic 5 line. See the 8 Gen 2 benchmark page for full scores.
Performance and gaming
Gaming lands around 40/100 on our scale — high settings in essentially every title, with 60 FPS Genshin Impact in well-cooled bodies like the S23 Ultra. Against Apple's same-year A16 the single-core gap is real (2,004 vs 2,631 Geekbench) but multi-core is much closer, and the Adreno 740 holds its own in graphics. Efficiency is the generation's signature: cool, quiet, sustained — everything the 8 Gen 1 was not.
Phones that ship with it
| Phone | Year | Used band |
|---|---|---|
| Samsung Galaxy S23 / S23 Plus / S23 Ultra | 2023 | $215–445 |
| Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 / Z Fold 5 | 2023 | $200 / $400 |
| Honor Magic 5 / Magic V2 | 2023 | $490 / $1,170 |
| Motorola Edge Plus (2023) | 2023 | New-only listings |
Buying advice
In 2026 this is the value sweet spot of the Android used market. The Galaxy S23 trades near $215 and the S23 Ultra near $440 — our S23 Ultra review and its comparison with the iPhone 14 show the cross-ecosystem math, while the Z Flip 5 review covers the folding route at about $200. One generation up, the 8 Gen 3 guide explains what the step to 2024 silicon buys; one down, the 8 Gen 1 page explains why the discount exists.
Benchmarks
| Geekbench 6 single-core | 2,004 #21 of 80 SoCs |
|---|---|
| Geekbench 6 multi-core | 5,311 #22 of 80 SoCs |
| AnTuTu benchmark | 1,757,044 #19 of 80 SoCs |