Qualcomm says its new Snapdragon chips are 'the fastest and most efficient' for Windows PCs

Qualcomm has unveiled its new Snapdragon X Series chips for laptops, in addition to its new system-on-a-chip for flagship phones. The Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme chip meant for "ultra-premium" Windows 11 laptops are designed to handle "complex, expert-level workloads" and to enable fast AI processing, as well as a multi-day battery life. Meanwhile, the Snapdragon X2 Elite chips come in two variants, one with 18 total cores and one with 12. Qualcomm claims that these processors are the "fastest, most powerful and efficient processors for Windows PCs."

The company launched the first Snapdragon X Elite chip in 2023 as its successor to the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 line of laptop processors. Qualcomm changed its name back then to reflect the huge leap in performance. Microsoft released a lineup of Copilot+ PCs with the new Snapdragon chip in 2024. And then earlier this year, at CES, Qualcomm unveiled the Snapdragon ...