Typically, the base model and the “plus” version of Samsung’s flagship Galaxy S line are powered by its own Exynos application processor (AP) in most markets. However, in the U.S., Canada, and China, these handsets are equipped with a customized version of the latest flagship Snapdragon 8 series AP which this year is the Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy. The Galaxy S Ultra model features the Snapdragon chipset in all regions.
Samsung decided that the safest course of action was to power each Galaxy S25 and Galaxy S25+ phone with the Snapdragon 8 Elite, a pricey move considering that Qualcomm jacked up the price of the component. The new flagship series was released earlier this month, on February 7th to be precise, and only now has Samsung Foundry reportedly started mass production of the Exynos 2500 AP.
Similar to its predecessor, the Exynos 2500 is a decacore processor with a configuration that includes:
- 1x Cortex-X925 CPU prime core running at a peak clock speed of 3.3GHz
- 2x Cortex-A725 CPU performance-efficiency core with a 2.75GHz clock speed
- 3x Cortex-A725 CPU performance-efficiency core with a 2.36GHz clock speed
- 4x Cortex-A520 CPU efficiency core with a 1.8GHz peak clock speed
The Xclipse 950 GPU, a collaboration between Samsung and AMD, is also part of the Exynos 2500 SoC.
Geekbench tests have shown that the Snapdragon 8 Elite outperforms the Exynos 2500 in both single-core and multi-core benchmark tests which means that Galaxy S25 and Galaxy S25+ buyers outside of the U.S., Canada, and China might have lucked out and are thankful for Samsung Foundry’s yield issues.
