Yesterday, an inside source spilled the beans on the upcoming google Tensor G3. That gave us early official information about the specifications of the chipset. And in case you missed it, the new processor that's planned to debut with the Google Pixel 8 will offer multiple upgrades.
These upgrades range from a better CPU configuration and security upgrades to a brand-new ray-tracing onboard GPU. As far as I can tell, these upgrades should make the Tensor G3 better compete with the current flagships. But a Geekbench listing of the processor has popped out. And it says the complete opposite!
Even Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Shown to Perform Better Than Google Tensor G3
Revegnus, a reliable source for early smartphone information, has come across a Geekbench listing. As the picture shared by Revegnus shows, the listing is supposedly for the upcoming Google Tensor G3. And interestingly, the listing is indeed present in the database of Geekbench.
It says that the benchmark results are for “Google Factory build on Ripcurrent.” Nonetheless, as you can see from the listing, the Google Tensor G3 is shown to offer a single-core score of 1186. On the other hand, the multi-core score is at 3809.
To give you a perspective, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 scores 1615 in the single-core test of Geekbench 5. And for multi-core, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 gets 3840. So, in both cases, the Geekbench results show that the Google Tensor G3 performed worse than the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. And the important part is that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 is a last-generation chipset. It was released back in 2021.
The current generation flagship SoC, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, gets 1867 in single-core. And for the multi-core test, the 8 Gen 2 obtains an impressive 5137 score. That's a big difference from what the Geekbench listing of the Google Tensor G3 is showing.
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Is This Google Tensor G3 Listing Real?
There are a couple of red flags on the Geekbench listing of Google Tensor G3. Let's take a closer look –
Not From a Recent Test
First of all, it shows that the chipset was tested on April 12. In other words, it's not from a recent test. This could eventually mean that the results are from an engineering sample. And engineering samples are very early versions of the final SoC.
Mismatched Clock Speed Information
A closer look shows that the Geekbench 5 listing shows that it is a 9-core cluster. This matches the information we got yesterday. Even the core clocks match the information shared by the inside source. That is, the Tensor G3 has 4x cores @ 2.1 GHz, 4x cores @ 2.45 GHz, and 1x core @3.02 GHz.
But as Mapple_Gold points out, the Geekbench listing does not confirm that the SoC has a Cortex X3 core. As I covered yesterday, the single Cortex X3 core @ 3.0 GHz is one of the main highlights of the Google Tensor G3. And if the test was indeed on an SoC without the Cortex X3, the unimpressive scores do make a lot of sense.
The thing is, Geekbench scores can be easily manipulated. And the screenshot provided by Quadrans Muralis further solidifies this claim. As he shows, the Geekbench result was from a chipset that was running at @2.78 GHz. But the listing showed that it ran at 3.02 GHz.
No matter what, we surely hope that the actual scores of the Google Tensor G3 are much higher than this Geekbench listing. Otherwise, the Pixel 8 series will be very weak against the competition. But for now, you should treat the listing information with a good grain of salt. And as always, we will update you when we get more concrete data about the SoC's performance.
Spec Comparison of Google Tensor G3, Tensor G2, and Tensor G1
| Cores | G1 (Pixel 6) | G2 (Pixel 7) | G3 (Pixel 8) |
| Big Cores | 2x Cortex-X1 @ 2.8GHz | 2x Cortex-X1 @ 2.85GHz | 1x Cortex-X3 @ 3.0GHz |
| Mid Cores | 2x Cortex-A76 @ 2.25GHz | 2x Cortex-A78 @ 2.3GHz | 4x Cortex-A715 @ 2.45GHz |
| Little Cores | Cortex-A55 x4 @ 1.8GHz | 4x Cortex-A55 @ 1.8GHz | 4x Cortex-A510 @ 2.15GHz |
Via: gizchina.com
