The first Snapdragon X Elite and Snapdragon X Plus laptops have arrived and we are testing them in our labs. Qualcomm’s new Arm-based processors promise performance and efficiency on par with Apple’s M-series chips. Given how the best MacBooks are the current gold standard for performance and endurance, Snapdragon X chips could make the best Windows laptops as tempting as Apple’s .
Tom’s Guide has tested or is testing several Snapdragon X laptops, such as the Asus Vivobook S 15, Microsoft Surface Pro 11, and HP Omnibook X. Based on our test results so far, the Snapdragon X Elite matches or beats the Apple M processors. It also keeps pace with laptops featuring Intel’s AI-focused Meteor Lake chips. Battery life results are still awaited, although we do have at least one promising result to discuss.
So how well does the Snapdragon X Elite fare against the competition? You can check out our performance benchmark results below. We’ll update this post with more battery life results once we have them.
General performance
The Snapdragon X Elite is a truly powerful laptop processor. So far, we’ve tested units packing the Snapdragon X Elite X1E80100. This CPU has 12 cores, a base clock of 3.4 GHz and 45 TOPS. It’s not the highest X Elite chip, but it’s not the lowest either, as you can see on the Qualcomm website. The results are quite impressive.
On Geekbench 6, which tests overall CPU performance, the Snapdragon X Elite performed well in the single-core and multi-core benchmark tests. Qualcomm previously claimed that its silicon could crush Apple’s M3 chip. While not quite, the Snapdragon X Elite laptops are certainly on par (or better) than Apple’s silicon. The chip also performs well against the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H CPU, which is a mid-range Meteor Lake processor.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | Geekbench 6 (single core) | Geekbench 6 (multi-core) | Handbrake (min:s) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Microsoft Surface Pro 11 (X Elite) | 2,813 | 14,432 | 5:24 am |
| HP OmniBook X (X Elite) | 2,347 | 12,861 | 6:20 am |
| HP EliteBook Ultra (X Elite) | 2,371 | 12,717 | 6:24 am |
| Asus Vivobook S 15 (X Elite)* | 2,418 | 14,352 | 6:50 am |
| MacBook Air 13-inch M3 | 3,082 | 12,087 | 7:40 a.m |
| MacBook Air 15-inch M3 | 3.102 | 12,052 | 6:34 am |
| MacBook Pro 14-inch M3 | 3,037 | 11,968 | 5:38 am |
| Dell XPS 14 (Meteor Lake) | 2,326 | 12,701 | 5:49 am |
| HP Omen Transcend 14 (Meteor Lake) | 2,362 | 13,248 | 4:57 am |
| Acer Swift Go 14 (Meteor Lake) | 2,364 | 12,612 | 5:16 a.m |
While the 13-inch MacBook Air, 15-inch MacBook Air, and 14-inch MacBook Pro powered by the M3 have better single-core performance than their competitors, laptops with X Elite and Ultra 7 processors have better multi-core performance—especially the Microsoft Surface Pro 11. In real-world use, you probably won’t notice a major difference, but it’s interesting to see how the M3 lags in multi-core.
The Snapdragon X Elite laptops also performed well in our Handbrake video editing test, which involves transcoding a 4K video clip to 1080p. The Surface Pro 11 performed the task a minute faster than the HP laptop. All of the X Elite laptops finished faster than the Apple M3 MacBooks, though the Meteor Lake machines were faster overall.
Note that the numbers for the Asus Vivobook S 15 are taken directly from Managing Editor Jason England’s testing, not our test lab numbers. We’ll update these numbers once we get our hands on the Asus laptop, which should be soon.
Gaming performance
Don’t expect to play the best PC games with decent frame rates on Snapdragon X Elite laptops. Some titles like Fortnite can’t run on these machines because they weren’t built for Arm-based computers. You can use the Prism emulation tool to run x86 games on Arma, but the fact remains that native gaming on these machines can be a problem.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | Civilization VI Rest Frame Rate Results (@ 1080p) |
|---|---|
| Microsoft Surface Pro 11 (X Elite) | 20 frames per second |
| HP OmniBook X (X Elite) | 20 frames per second |
| MacBook Air 13-inch M3 | 41 frames per second (@ 1200p) |
| MacBook Pro 14-inch M3 | 51 frames per second (@ 1200p) |
| Dell XPS 14 (Meteor Lake) | 47 frames per second |
| Acer Swift Go 14 (Meteor Lake) | 36 frames per second |
As you can see above, Civilization VI, which is not a graphically demanding game, only manages 20 frames per second on the Snapdragon X Elite laptops we tested. Although it couldn’t reach 60 frames per second on the M3 or Meteor Lake laptops, the game runs at an acceptable frame rate.
But this is just one game. We’ll compare more titles and continue testing Snapdragon X Elite laptops.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | Microsoft Surface Pro 11 | Acer Swift Go 14 |
|---|---|---|
| 3DMark Time Spy | 1887 | 3827 |
| 3DMark Fire Strike | 5743 | 8046 |
| 3DMark Night Raid | 24853 | 27154 |
The Snapdragon X Elite also didn’t fare well in the 3DMark graphics test compared to the Intel Core Ultra.
Bottom line, if you want to play demanding games, you will be better off with one of the best gaming laptops.
Battery life (preliminary)
We’re still running battery tests on our Snapdragon X Elite laptops. That’s because at the time of writing, two of these machines had been running for more than 12 hours. And given the first test result of one of these machines, it looks like the Snapdragon X could finally help Windows laptops last almost as long (or maybe longer) than MacBooks.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | Time (hours:min) |
|---|---|
| Microsoft Surface Pro 11* | 12:10 (first launch) |
| MacBook Air 13-inch (M3) | 15:10 |
| MacBook Air 15-inch (M3) | 17:16 |
| Acer Swift Go 14 | 8:25 |
In our battery test, which includes continuous web surfing over Wi-Fi with the display brightness set to 150 nits, the Microsoft Surface Pro 11 lasted 12 hours and 10 minutes. We usually do three battery tests and average the times, but the fact that we’re seeing just over 12 hours on a Windows PC is a great sign.
While 12 hours is impressive, it’s still nowhere near the MacBooks in the chart above. But to be fair, few laptops can match Apple when it comes to battery life.
Compatibility issues
As we mentioned, various applications and games will not launch on CoPilot+ computers at startup. Samsung has released which apps and games won’t run on its Galaxy Book 4 Edge. Since this laptop runs on a Snapdragon X Elite chip, we expect that the mentioned apps and games will also not work on similar laptops from other manufacturers.
The compatibility notice (first reported by The Wall Street Journal), reports that many security programs, various Adobe software, and Google Drive are currently not running on Samsung’s new Copilot+ PC notebook. Games like League of Legends and Microsoft Halo Infinite it also won’t work on Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Edge AI and probably all CoPilot+ PCs.
Compatibility issues could be resolved as more developers build apps and games for the Arm architecture. However, this can take some time – if at all for some apps.
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Although the Snapdragon X Elite won’t completely destroy the competition, Qualcomm’s chip looks very competitive with Intel and Apple Silicon. While not great for gaming (at the moment), the Snapdragon X Elite laptops offer excellent performance and (potentially) strong battery life.
If more Snapdragon X Elite (and X Plus) laptops deliver similar results, I think it’s safe to say Qualcomm has put Apple and Intel on notice.
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