Just how fast is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 Plus compared to the Samsung Exynos 990?

Let’s find out in our very own performance comparison!

 

Snapdragon 865 Plus vs Exynos 990 : What’s The Deal?

When Samsung announced the Galaxy Note 20 and Galaxy Note 20 Ultra smartphones, they were criticised for using the Exynos 990 in the global edition, instead of the Snapdragon 865 Plus.

Samsung only chose to use the Snapdragon 865 Plus for Galaxy Note 20 and Galaxy Note 20 Ultra smartphones sold in South Korea, China, Japan and the United States.

But just how much faster is the Snapdragon 865 Plus, compared to the Exynos 990? Let’s find out…

 

Snapdragon 865 Plus vs Exynos 990 : A Quick Primer

The Samsung Exynos 990 isn’t a particularly old platform, powering the Samsung Galaxy S20 smartphones. But it lagged behind the Snapdragon 865, which received a performance boost in the 865+ variant.

They are both 7 nm mobile SoCs that support LPDDR5 memory, and UFS 3.0 storage, but lack an integrated 5G modem.

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 Plus is essentially an overclocked variant, with its single Prime core clocked at 3.1 GHz (instead of 2.84 GHz), and a 10% faster Adreno 650 GPU.

It has three sustained performance Kryo 585 Gold (A77) cores at 2.4 GHz, and four low-power Kryo 585 Silver (A55) cores at 1.8 GHz.

The Samsung Exynos 990 has two high-speed Mongoose 5 cores, clocked at a more sedate 2.7 GHz, two sustained performance A76 cores at 2.5 GHz, and four low-power A55 cores at 2.0 GHz.

	Snapdragon 865 Plus	Exynos 990
Process	7 nm N7P	7 nm EUV
CPU Cores	1 x Kryo 585 Gold (3.1 GHz) 3 x Kryo 585 Gold (2.4 GHz) 4 x Kryo 585 Silver (1.8 GHz)	2 x Exynos M5 (2.7 GHz) 2 x Cortex-A76 (2.5 GHz) 4 x Cortex-A55 (2.0 GHz)
GPU	Adreno 650	Mali-G77 MP11
Memory Support	LPDDR5	LPDDR5
Storage Support	UFS 3.0	UFS 3.0 / 2.1
5G Modem	Snapdragon X55 (Separate) – 7.5 Gbps	Exynos 5123 (Separate) – 7.35 Gbps

Now, we could not get our hands on an actual Galaxy Note 20 or Galaxy Note 20 Ultra powered by the Snapdragon 865+, so we used the next best thing – the new Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 Plus!

 

Snapdragon 865 Plus vs Exynos 990 : TLDR Summary

For those who are too lazy to drill down into the results, here’s a quick and dirty summary.

The Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 Plus is definitely the superior platform. In most benchmarks, it was significantly faster than the Samsung Exynos 990.

• PCMark : +19.4% faster
• Sling Shot Extreme (OpenGL) : +4.8% faster
• Sling Shot Extreme (Vulkan) : +12.8% faster
• Sling Shot : +8.2% faster
• Geekbench (Single Core) : +2.2% faster
• AnTuTu : +10.5% faster

The Samsung Exynos 990 was only slightly faster in a single benchmark :

• Geekbench (Multi Core) : +0.5% faster

That said, these are benchmark results. You are unlikely to actually notice the performance difference in real world usage, even in high-end games.

Samsung appears to acknowledge this performance difference, and compensate for it by giving Exynos models double the storage – 256 GB instead of 128 GB.

So if you have the option to choose between the Snapdragon and Exynos versions of the Galaxy Note 20 or Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, it’s really a choice between the faster Snapdragon 865+ platform, or the slower Exynos 990 with double the storage.

 

Snapdragon 865 Plus vs Exynos 990 : PCMark

The Snapdragon 865+ was faster than the Exynos 990 in these tests :

• Data Manipulation : +42%
• Web Browsing 2.0 : +37.4%
• Overall Work 2.0 : +19.4%
• Writing 2.0 : +13.6%

The Exynos 990 was faster than the Snapdragon 865+ in one test :

• Photo Editing 2.0 : +12%

 

Snapdragon 865 Plus vs Exynos 990 : 3DMark

The Snapdragon 865+ was faster than the Exynos 990 in all three benchmarks :

• Sling Shot Extreme (OpenGL) : +4.8%
• Sling Shot Extreme (Vulkan) : +12.8%
• Sling Shot : +8.2%

The Snapdragon 865+ was faster than the Exynos 990 in all six tests :

• Vulkan Graphics : +20.5%
• Vulkan Overall : +12.8%
• OpenGL Graphics : +6.6%
• OpenGL Overall : +4.8%
• Vulkan Physics : +3.0%
• OpenGL Physics : +1.6%

Next Page > Snapdragon 865 Plus vs Exynos 990 : Geekbench | AnTuTu

 

Support Tech ARP!

If you like our work, you can help support our work by visiting our sponsors, participating in the Tech ARP Forums, or even donating to our fund. Any help you can render is greatly appreciated!