Samsung Exynos 2200 unveiled: meet the Galaxy S22's AMD-powered super chip

A render of the Samsung Exynos 2200 mobile chipset, on a gold background — (Image credit: Samsung)

The Samsung Galaxy S22's most important component just got announced (at least for outside the U.S.). It's time to meet the Samsung Exynos 2200.

The 2200 is a new 4-nanometer chip that's just been announced by Samsung, and has already entered mass production. Its capabilities are similar to those of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, but the differences could have a big impact on the two versions of the Galaxy S22.

Exynos 2200: Xclipse 920 GPU and display specs

The chip's most interesting addition is the Xclipse 920 GPU, featuring AMD RDNA 2 graphics and ray-tracing capabilities. It also supports up to 8K video at 60 frames per second.

Ray-tracing on a smartphone, or just a smartphone with graphics from one of the two big names in gaming graphics, is unprecedented, and has us very excited to find out if this new GPU will make the Galaxy S22 one of the best phones around. This is the first result from what's apparently a multi-year partnership between Samsung and AMD, so we'll likely see the capabilities of Samsung mobile GPUs grow further on future generations of its mobile devices.

The chip's also capable of supporting up to a 4K display at a 120Hz refresh rate, an area where the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 only manages 60Hz support. We aren't expecting such a high resolution on the Galaxy S22, just FHD on the S22 and S22 Plus and QHD on the S22 Ultra. However, it's good news that the chip will easily handle 120Hz, the peak refresh rate that's rumored for all three models.

Exynos 2200 camera features and 5G

As for camera abilities, the Exynos 2200 chip can take 108MP photos at 30fps, with support up to 200MP images. The Galaxy S22 Ultra is rumored to have a 108MP main camera like last year's Galaxy S21 Ultra, so this is a particularly relevant spec. The Exynos can also take two images at once, at up to 64 and 32MP at 30 fps, and record up to 8K video at 30fps.

While it's quickly becoming a standard feature that you might just assume, the Exynos 2200 is indeed compatible with sub-6GHz and mmWave 5G. That should mean you get the best data speeds available no matter which network you're able to access.

The only thing missing from these specs are performance figures for the chip's clock speed and max 5G download speeds. These are a pretty glaring omission for anyone interested in chipsets, and leaving them out suggests that Samsung hasn't finished tuning the chip to a level it's happy with. Even if the chip's already in production, it feels like there are going to be some tweaks and a further announcement of performance results before we see the Exynos 2200 in use.

Exynos 2200 and Galaxy S22 outlook

Samsung didn't mention where we'd see the Exynos 2200 used first. However, the most obvious guess is the Galaxy S22, which is expected to launch in early February at the Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2022 event.

The U.S. version of these phones is still expected to use the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset. Normally the Snapdragon version of a Galaxy S phone offers superior performance to the Exynos version sold elsewhere in the world. While we can't know for sure until Samsung releases official performance figures, it looks like Samsung buyers outside the U.S. have something to be excited about this time around.

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Richard is based in London, covering news, reviews and how-tos for phones, tablets, gaming, and whatever else people need advice on. Following on from his MA in Magazine Journalism at the University of Sheffield, he's also written for WIRED U.K., The Register and Creative Bloq. When not at work, he's likely thinking about how to brew the perfect cup of specialty coffee.