Qualcomm’s next push into high-performance Windows laptops is starting to show up in benchmarks, and the early numbers look promising.
The upcoming Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme (X2E-96-100) has finally appeared in a leaked Geekbench listing tied to an Asus Zenbook A16 configuration with 48GB of RAM. While the chip was announced earlier and even shown in a few prototype devices at CES 2026, this is one of the first independent benchmark entries to surface publicly.
In Geekbench 6.6.0, the processor reportedly scored 4,033 in single-core and 23,198 in multi-core tests. Those results put it in interesting territory.
On the single-core side, the chip appears to edge past Apple’s Apple M4 Max, which typically lands somewhere around the high-3,800 to low-3,900 range in the same benchmark. Multi-core performance still favors Apple, though, with the M4 Max hovering closer to 25,700.
Compared with current Windows-focused competitors, the results look significantly stronger. AMD’s top Strix Halo configurations generally score around 2,900 single-core and 18,000 multi-core, while Intel’s Core Ultra X9 388H Panther Lake part sits roughly in the 3,000 / 17,800 range. If the numbers hold up, Qualcomm’s new chip would represent a clear step forward for Windows-on-Arm performance.
Graphics performance also appears to have taken a notable leap. The integrated Adreno X2-90 GPU — listed with 16 compute units — achieved 44,786 points in Geekbench’s OpenCL test. That’s almost double what earlier Snapdragon X Elite graphics managed in similar benchmarks.
The Snapdragon X2 Elite lineup is expected to feature Qualcomm’s updated Oryon CPU architecture, with an 18-core design and boost clocks reportedly reaching up to 5.0 GHz on prime cores. The chip also includes an 80 TOPS NPU aimed at accelerating AI workloads.
The leak gives an early glimpse of Qualcomm’s ambitions. The company has spent the past few years positioning Snapdragon chips as a serious alternative to traditional laptop processors, promising much improved power efficiency and battery life.
If production laptops deliver results close to these numbers, the Snapdragon X2 Elite could end up being Qualcomm’s strongest attempt yet at challenging both Apple Silicon and the latest x86 processors.
Don’t miss a thing! Join our Telegram community for instant updates and grab our free daily newsletter for the best tech stories!
For more daily updates, please visit our News Section.
Comments