Asus ROG Phone 8 Pro’s Geekbench score exceeds Apple’s A17 Pro — here’s what we know
Asus is coming for Apple's multi-core throne
One of the main things consumers look for in gaming smartphones is the speed of the chipset. It seems Asus agrees and has released a teaser about the Asus ROG Phone 8 Pro with its Geekbench 6 multi-core test score.
According to Asus, the ROG Phone 8 Pro manages to put up a multi-core score of 7,422 while using the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset. This would exceed the scores for both the iPhone 15’s A16 Bionic chip and the A17 Pro chip of the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max. However, it should be noted that Asus has not shared a single core score. This isn’t surprising as the Snapdragon chip series seemingly struggles against Apple in this test.
For those who don’t know, Geekbench is the industry standard testing software when it comes to phones. It is an installable program that pushes the specifications of the phones and then records the results. We here at Tom’s Guide, and most other outlets, use it in our in-house testing and the results are usually very accurate.
This is an impressive score and certainly helps to give an impression of the power of the Asus ROG Phone 8 Pro. It is important to note that the Asus ROG Phone 7 Ultimate obtained a score 5,692 in our tests. As such it appears that the ROG Phone 8 Pro will be much faster than its predecessors.
These numbers may look intimidating, but they essentially rate how fast the phone will be able to load images and run programs like games. The higher the number, the better the phone will be. However, the chipset does not work alone and If we combine this score with the rumored RAM amounts of the Asus ROG Phone 8 — which are apparently between 16GB and 24GB — then it looks to be a major powerhouse.
One of the reasons for this boost over Apple's chip is that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 is equipped with an 8-core CPU cluster compared to the A17 Pro’s 6-core configuration. This means that the Snapdragon should be able to score higher with little issue, and the gap is not as far as would be expected. However, simply beating Apple's chip is impressive, as they were the main winners in our end-of-year round-up of the fastest phones in 2023 and far exceeded the competition.
It should also be noted that the Asus ROG Phone 8 Pro is a gaming phone, and as you'd surmise, it will have a larger vapor chamber than most other phones. This will allow the chipset to remain cool while running more demanding software than other models. There were some indications that the A17 Pro chip has an issue with thermal throttling that can cause a slowdown when running games.
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While it is common for developers to test phones in an environment that benefits the phone, the average user experience you still vary. However, even this score gives us a good idea of how the phone will likely run and what to expect. We will know more when we have a chance to review the phone on its release date, which has been stated to be around January 16th for China.
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Josh is a staff writer for Tom's Guide and is based in the UK. He has worked for several publications but now works primarily on mobile phones. Outside of phones, he has a passion for video games, novels, and Warhammer.