Snapdragon 480 is the first 4-series 5G chipset from Qualcomm

 Qualcomm’s budget-friendly 4-series chipset line just got its first 5G SoC with the freshly announced Snapdragon 480. It’s bound to power more affordable 5G phones in the coming year. The chipset is built on the 8nm process and comes with an integrated Snapdragon X51 5G Modem-RF system with support for both mmWave and Sub-6 GHz networks.

On the CPU side, we have the Kryo 460 performance cores based on the Cortex-A76 clocked at 2.0GHz alongside more power-efficient A55 cores working at 1.8GHz. The GPU is an Adreno 619. Qualcomm is boasting a two-fold increase in both CPU and GPU performance compared to the Snapdragon 460 chipset. AI tasks will be 70% faster thanks to the Qualcomm Hexagon 686 chipset.

Chipset (process)	Snapdragon 460 (11 nm)	Snapdragon 480 (8 nm)
CPU	Octa-core up to 1.8 GHz Kryo 240	Octa-core up to 2 GHz Kryo 460
GPU	Adreno 610	Adreno 619
Photo	Spectra 340 Up to 48 MP; 1080p @ 60 fps	Spectra 345 Up to 64MP; 1080p @ 60 fps
Modem	Snapdragon X11 LTE	Snapdragon X51 5G
Connectivity	Dual VoLTE; Wi-Fi 6 Bluetooth 5.1	mmWave + Sub-6 Ghz; Wi-Fi 6 Bluetooth 5.1
Fast charging	Quick Charge 3	Quick Charge 4+

Other specs include support for 120Hz refresh rate displays with FHD+ resolution, 64MP camera sensors and 1080p recording at 60 fps. The SD480 comes with Qualcomm’s Spectra 345 ISP which supports simultaneous capture from up to three camera sensors. The new chipset also gains SA and NSA 5G modes, Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DDS), Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.1 connectivity.

Snapdragon 480 key specs

The Snapdragon 480 is expected to debut on budget 5G phones from a range of makers including vivo, Oppo, Xiaomi, Motorola, and Nokia sometime in Q1 2021.