Xiaomi Xring O3 is a Contradiction: Using Old Tech to Beat Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro and Dimensity 9600

Xiaomi has been working for years in its proprietary SoCs, and it seems that this year, the concept has finally matured. The company unveiled that the Xiaomi 18 Fold will carry the in-house Xiaomi Xring O3 chip, the successor to the Xring O1.

While the demise of the O2 remains a mystery, the Xiaomi Xring O3 is here to challenge the industry. Using older tech, it can challenge the latest flagship SoCs.

The folks at Geekerwan examined the new chip and say it delivers a two-generation improvement in energy efficiency when compared to the Xiaomi O1. The Xring O3 is fabbed by TSMC on a 3nm node called N3P. The same node is used on the Dimensity 9500 and Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, which are about to be replaced by the Dimensity 9600 and Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 series with their 2nm node.

Xiaomi also used the ARM C1 series of CPU cores, also used in the Dimensity 9500 and Exynos 2600. While Qualcomm uses proprietary tech, the Dimensity 9600 will stick with Mali and use the ARM C2 cores, which will likely be announced soon.

As we can clearly see, the Xiaomi Xring O3 sounds like a competitor to last year's flagship SoCs. Yet, the optimization does an amazing job, and the chipset surprisingly delivers results that are on par with what we would expect for a 2027 flagship SoC. For instance, the Xring O3 crushes the Dimensity 9500 in performance and energy efficiency and comes close to Appleś A19 CPU cores.

At full power, the CPU can reach 15,000 points in the multi-core Geekbench. As a result, it can get close to the Apple M5 level of performance. However, we won´t see this anytime soon in a smartphone since it goes above 20W of power. At reasonable levels, it can hit 12,000 points. This is on par with the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5.

It's worth noting that all these tests are performed on a testing development board. The Xiaomi 18 Fold isn´t available yet. These tests will be re-run once the phone becomes available in the market.

While the official details are not available yet, the Xiaomi Xring O3 is believed to come with older C1 cores but with a new GPU. It will have the ARM G2-Ultra NX MC16 GPU. This 16-core GPU has two core types: one regular and one with the NX extension. This technology will help with AI-powered image upscaling and frame generation for games.

This GPU alone is a technological wonder. If we see it in a laptop, it will be able to beat laptops with Intel Lunar Lake and come close to M5-powered MacBooks. Compared to desktops, this beats a desktop PC with a GeForce GTX 1060 6GB.

We are excited to see this chipset in action once it reaches the market with the Xiaomi 18 Fold. It's nice to see Xiaomi managed to deliver a competitive rival to the big ones. However, this also serves as a countermeasure plan if certain political tensions rise in the future. The brand is banned from using 2nm TSMC nodes for political reasons, and that explains why it's using the 3nm tech.

We expect to hear more details soon as the Xiaomi 18 series release draws near in the horizon.