It’s official: Nothing Phone 3 uses Snapdragon 8S Gen 4 chipset.
No CEO Carl Pei revealed the special detail of an interview that was uploaded to the company’s YouTube channel, confirming that nothing is “First True Flagship” phone will be “36% faster on CPU, 88% stronger on GPU and 60% stronger on NPU” End Nothing Phone 2.
Big numbers! Apart from Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1-Equipped Nothing Phone 2 is almost two years old, and at Nothing’s own recording it is not a true flagship, so you would expect phone 3 to deliver a serious jump in performance. The even bigger elephant in space is that nothing is “first true flagship” does not use Snapdragon 8 Elite Chipset, which in any case is it at the moment Fastest gun in the west. Is this a terrible revelation? I’m not that sure.
Look, it’s true that many of the best Android phones use Qualcomm’s latest top-end chipest, and it’s also true that in not Using Snapdragon 8 Elite, the Nothing Phone 3 will probably hang behind the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra and OnePlus 13 in Benchmarkest and Push-Your-phone-two-the-Limit use cases.
If you are someone who likes to maximize each setting in Call of Duty: Mobile Or record long videos in 8K, Nothing Phone 3 won’t be for you. But nothing is not and will never be a brand for these types of power users.
Carl Pei founded nothing in 2020 with a mission to “make tech cool again” and that ethos has been clear in every phone that has been released so far (we described the company’s latest effort, Noteing Phone 3A Pro, as “the most interesting phone you can buy for less than $ 500 / £ 500 / AU $ 850” in our review).
Nothing is the next challenge is to make a “cool” phone that is not noticeably slower or buggi than the best phones on the market. And any device that suits this transfer can, I think, can be described exactly as “a real flagship”.
By using Snapdragon 8S Gen 4 chipset, Nothing Phone 3 will feel like a flagship in comparison to no phones with old, but I’m also 99% sure it will feel like a flagship compared to iPhones, Samsung phones and pixel phones in the world.
As I wrote in a similar minded piece last year: “In my opinion, we have reached a saturation point when it comes to the speed of flagship phones. Not necessarily the total mobile performance, mind but the way these phones feel When you move through them. “
If the Snapdragon 8S Gen 4 chips can deliver a smooth experience while rolling, streaming, welding, games, taking photos or doing some of the other things you do with their phone in 2025, I think it’s a perfectly acceptable chipset choice for a flagship hand set that is aimed at those who appreciate aesthetics over raw, unmitigated power.
Consider Google’s latest flagship phone, Pixel 9 Pro.
In any case, its Tensor G4 chips is weaker than the competition, yet the Pixel 9 Pro Pretty sits as the ‘best Android’ option on our list of the best phones and also scooped our phone to the year in 2024. Silicon.
The price argument is a little harder to reject. Rumors set Nothing Phone 3’s price tag for about $ 799 / £ 799 / AU $ 1,300, which would bring the phone in accordance with the Snapdragon 8 Elite Equipment Samsung Galaxy S25.
Of course, no upcoming handset is unable to compete with Samsung’s latest base model for Raw Power, but with Carl Pei promising “Premium materials and software that really smoothing things out,” I am convinced that phone 3 will deliver on CEO’s “TRUE flagship” promise.
