If you’ve used an Android smartphone before, high chances are that your smartphone is either powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon or MediaTek Dimensity processor. But recently, there’s a third player slowing growing into the smartphone space, and their name is UNISOC, with their UNISOC 5G SoC (System-on-a-Chip) for Android smartphones.

UNISOC, formerly known as Spreadtrum, is a Chinese fabless semiconductor company headquartered in Shanghai which produces chipsets for Android smartphones. UNISOC chipsets have passed the validation of more than 260 carriers from 133 countries worldwide. Some of their high-profile customers for purchasing their processors include HONOR, realme, vivo, Samsung, Motorola, Hisense and ZTE for their smartphones.

Out of their entire lineup currently available, in this article, we’ll be comparing whether UNISOC’s four 5G smartphone processors can compete with the big boys in the market, which are known as MediaTek and Qualcomm respectively. 

UNISOC has four notable 5G smartphone processors, which are the UNISOC T750, T760, T770, and T820. One of these 4 processors can be listed as a Tier C performing processors, whereas the other remaining 3 can be viewed as C+ performing processors.

Tier C: Low Performance Processors

Starting off with the only Tier C processor from UNISOC is the UNISOC T750. It comes with 5G connectivity,  2 ARM Cortex A76 CPU performance cores and 6 ARM Cortex A55 CPU efficiency cores. The GPU under the hood is the ARM Mali-G57 MP2 which is equivalent in performance to the ARM Mali G57 MC2, and the Qualcomm Adreno 618. 

As seen above, the UNISOC T750 is approximately equivalent to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 730 found on the Samsung Galaxy A71 (2019) or the MediaTek Dimensity 6080 found on devices like the Redmi Note 13 5G and Redmi Note 11S 5G. However, manufactured on the newer TSMC 6nm process, the UNISOC T750 has several benefits over the Snapdragon such as better performance and better power efficiency.

The UNISOC T750 was released in May 2023 and is expected to arrive in Android devices by 2023 Q4.

Tier C+: Better Low Performance Processors

Next are the 3 Tier C+ processors from UNISOC, which are respectively the UNISOC T760, T770, and T820. All 3 feature the same CPU core configuration which 4 ARM Cortex A76 CPU performance cores, and 4 ARM Cortex A55 CPU efficiency cores, which is actually the same core configuration as the flagship Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 mobile processor found on the OnePlus 7 Pro, and Xiaomi Mi 9T Pro (Redmi K20 Pro). 

However, where these 3 UNISOC processors differ from the Snapdragon 855 is their GPU. Powering the T760, T770 and T820 is the ARM Mali G57 MP4 GPU, which is much behind the Adreno 640 on the Snapdragon 855, and closer to the Adreno 620 on the Snapdragon 765. Still the 4+4 CPU configuration allows the UNISOC processors to be ahead of its competitors by providing a flagship-type CPU core configuration at an affordable price despite the underpowered GPU.

The UNISOC T760, T770 and T820 can be found in devices like the Hisense P50 5G, ZTE Blade A73 5G, and the recently released ZTE Nubia Neo 5G, the company’s budget gaming smartphone from Nubia.

In conclusion, UNISOC processors are not useless, and in fact, they are quite underrated at the price that they are offered. UNISOC’s small portfolio of 5G smartphone processors is not competitive with the high-end processors from MediaTek and Qualcomm. However, at an affordable price, the UNISOC processors still have a place for “better than expected” performance in low-end Android smartphones.

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