Carl Pei: The Nothing Phone (2) will be powered by the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1

It was only earlier this month that Nothing released the first images of the upcoming Phone (2) from them, but the hype train doesn’t look like it’ll be stopping any time soon. Nothing founder and CEO Carl Pei has now confirmed that their upcoming premium smartphone will be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 system-on-chip.

Taking to Twitter, Pei revealed that the Nothing Phone (2) will be using the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset and listed down a bunch of reasons why they went with it too. For starters, despite being a year old now, the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 was apparently able to open up apps on the Phone (2) twice as fast as the Phone (1) which is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G+, with an overall performance improvement of 80%.

Pei was also quick to highlight that it’s not just about performance numbers, but rather the whole package. As such, by going for the Snapdragon 8 series chip instead of a Snapdragon 7 one, they are able to deliver significant improvements across the board such as better battery life, network connectivity and camera capabilities.

Being build on the TSMC 4nm process, the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 was known for being much more efficient than the original, Samsung-fabbed Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. The Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 also has a better 18-bit image signal processor than the one on the Phone (1), allowing Nothing to offer more features such as RAW HDR and 4K recording at 60fps on the upcoming Phone (2). And perhaps most importantly though, by going with a slightly older yet still powerful chipset, the cost will likely be cheaper than if they opted to go for the latest Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 instead.

Of course, we knew for quite some time now that the Nothing phone (2) will come with the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1. Pei and Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon had announced during MWC 2023 that the next Nothing smartphone will be powered by a then-unnamed Snapdragon 8 series processor, only for a Qualcomm executive to later accidentally reveal that it was the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 on LinkedIn. Nevertheless, now that Nothing and Pei has confirmed it, those of you who wanted a unique smartphone but lamented the Snapdragon 778G+ on the Phone (1) can get excited for the Phone (2) already.