Apple a12 vs a11 vs Snapdragon 845 SOC Specifications Comparison

Apple recently launched the A12 Bionic chip for its smartphones and claimed that it is one of the fastest chip ever found on a smartphone. It is a massive upgrade over the A11 which precedes the new smartphone chip from Apple. Similarly, when it comes to Android devices, Qualcomm has been a constant option on most of the device manufacturers. The latest flagship Qualcomm processor you would find is Snapdragon 845. How do these three smartphone processors compare against each other? We will see the essential differences between the three.

Also Read: APPLE A11 VS APPLE A10X VS SNAPDRAGON 835

The Apple A11 Processor

The Apple A11 processor was introduced with the iPhone 8. It was also found on the iPhone X. Considered to be one of the best and prominent options back then; it offers you a host of the first in the history of Apple.

The processor is manufactured using 10 nm manufacturing process and comes with six cores. Two of them are performance cores, while the rest four are meant for power efficiency requirements. What makes it a step ahead from the previous A10 processors is its ability to run all six cores simultaneously thereby providing excellent performance.

With 4.3 billion transistors on it, the A11 chips are possibly the biggest at the time it was launched.

The Apple A12 Processor

The first chipset from Apple that is manufactured with the latest 7 nm lithography process, the A12 comes with 6 cores.  Two of them are performance cores as usual, and the rest four are designed for power efficiency.

The GPU available on the A12 offers a 50 percent hike regarding performance when compared to its predecessor. The number transistors on the chip measure a whopping 6.9 billion. That would indeed make it one of the performance-oriented chipsets currently available.

Qualcomm Snapdragon 845

The latest from Qualcomm (of course, there are a few advanced products already announced – including the Snapdragon 855), the Snapdragon 845 is also referred to as SD845. Launched in 2018 by Qualcomm, it is one of the powerful and high-end chipsets widely used in several Android-based smartphones.

Manufactured using the 10 nm LPP FinFET process, it comes with the X20 LTE modem. The other features and options available include 802.11ac WiFi and dual channel LPDDR4X memory controller.

How do they differ between themselves?

Well, comparing a QUALCOMM Snapdragon 845 with the Apple processors may not be much ideal. However, now that all three have the basic functionality of controlling and making a smartphone work – we thought of comparing them together.

To begin with, we will differentiate the Apple A11 and A12 between each other. They do not have a vast difference between them and as such comparing them may not be much difficult.

The A11 is manufactured using the 10 nm manufacturing process, while the A12 is the first from Apple to utilize a 7 nm manufacturing process. Both of them come with six cores each of which two are used for the regular performance of the device, while the rest four are used for efficiency. However, there is a considerable difference between the power utilization on either of them.

The performance cores on Apple A12 are 15 percent more potent than the ones on the A11 chip. They also tend to consume 40 percent less energy in comparison. In the case of efficiency cores, the ones on the AA tend to consume percent more power. The GPU on the A12 chipset is slightly advanced in comparison.  The A12 has four cores on the GPU compared to the 3 cores on A11. The A12 has a GPU that is almost 50 percent faster than the A11.

Another advancement you would be able to find on the A12 in comparison to A11 is the number of cores in the neural engine. A11 has two cores on the neural engine, while the A12 has 8-cores. That would translate into better performance for the A12 which can run 5 trillion tasks per second when compared to the 600 million operations possible on the A11.

The number of transistors on the A11 measure 4.3 billion, while those on the newer A12 count 6.9 billion.

These are the significant fundamental differences between the A11 and A12. Now pitting these two siblings against the Snapdragon 845, you can compare how do these compare to the Snapdragon 845.

The Comparison between A11 vs A12 vs Snapdragon 845

For a better understanding between the three competing processors refer to the table below. It will help us understand the differences in a transparent way.

The Concluding Thoughts

Well, the Apple A12 has just been announced and may take a little time for it materializes and available in your Apple devices. However, it should be noted that it redefines the feature sets for the Apple chipset. While the Apple A12 is an upgrade to the Apple A11, it works almost at par with the Snapdragon 845. Both the processors have the same form factor, manufacturing process and a host of other features.

We assume the above comparison would have answered the queries you may have had concerning the three capable of smartphone processors. If still in doubt, share them with us.