MediaTek’s newest chip for flagship phones and tablets is… a lot like the company’s previous flagship processor. But it’s a little faster.
The new MediaTek Dimensity 9300+ is virtually identical to the Dimensity 9300 that launched in late 2023 in most respects. The key difference is that its most powerful CPU core has a top speed that’s slightly higher.
| MediaTek Dimensity 9300+ | MediaTek Dimensity 9300 | |
| CPU | 1 x Cortex-X4 @ 3.4 GHz 3 x Cortex-X4 @ 2.85 GHz 4 x Cortex-A720 @ 2 GHz | 1 x Cortex-X4 @ 3.25 GHz 3 x Cortex-X4 @ 2.85 GHz 4 x Cortex-A720 @ 2 GHz |
| GPU | Immortalis G720-MC12 | |
| RAM | LPDDR5X/T (up to 9600 MB/s) | LPDDR5T (up to 9600MB/s) |
| Wireless | WiFi 7 (6.5 Gbps) Bluetooth 5.4 5G Sub-6 GHz/mmWave (up to 7.9 Gbps) | |
| Camera | Up to 320MP (single camera) Up to 4K @ 60 fps (video) Up to 8K @ 30 fps (video) 18-bit ISP | |
| Display | Up to 4K @ 120 Hz Up to WQHD @ 180 Hz | |
Both processors take the unusual approach to ARM’s big.LITTLE architecture by going all-inn on the “big” cores designed for high performance, while leaving out any of ARM’s lower-power cores designed for energy efficiency.
In this case, that means that MediaTek’s octa-core chips feature four ARM Cortex-X4 CPU cores and four Cortex-A720 cores. And one of the Cortex-X4 cores in each chip is faster than the rest.
What sets the Dimensity 9300+ apart from its predecessor is that its fastest CPU core can run at speeds up to 3.4 GHz, while the Dimensity 9300’s fastest core’s max frequency is 3.25 GHz.
That’s… honestly about it for the differences. All the other features that MediaTek mentions in its press release for the new processor also apply to the Dimensity 9300, including the ARM Immortalis-G7720 GPu, the APU 790 AI engine, and the Imagiq 990 ISP.
MediaTek claims that the slightly higher speed of the new chip “is designed to accelerate on-device generative AI processing, offering broader support for LLMs, and other performance enhancements over the Dimensity 9300.” But in a nutshell, this is a slightly overclocked Dimensity 9300 processor. Not that this is a bad thing: that’s already a pretty powerful chip that’s well positioned to compete with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor. And the new model is… a little faster, I guess.
They already caught up with Snapdragon flagship SoC? I kinda thought they were a bit behind.
Realistically though, in practice…. Mediatek chips are still mostly on mid range devices, right? Really asking, I dunno what the current state is.
Seems this is also a mix of 4nm process with 6, so also on par with Snapdragon.
UNISOC seems to be also catching up, but afaik their latest SoC was on 6nm process.
Overall SoC performance varies heavily from SoC to SoC and where on the MT stack you fall, but the tripping point is usually GPU performance. MediaTek doesn’t like offering more than 1 latest flagship SoC in the 9000 series at a time which means they can’t make the GPU too large, or they price themselves out of ‘budget premium’ devices that may cost, say, $400 or $500 US street price.
This chip is entirely 4nm; their product stack varies depending on whether optimizing for cost, energy efficiency, performance, or chip size (which is usually but not always the same as cost; the ARM licenses aren’t free). They’ve made some real gems that finally allow a $150~200 Android tablet to be a pretty decent experience; fully licensed, charger in box, and everything. Even 5 years ago, that class of product was just a scam; now they’re the kind of product One Laptop Per Child wanted to be.
Since the GPU is a large part of the chip, they could absolutely meet Qualcomm in all areas of performance by throwing cost to the wind and making their GPU with 16 shader cores as opposed to the 12 in this one (Immortalis G720-MC12 = 12 cores), which I believe is the maximum this GPU gen can support.
However, that would add an extra $10~$20 to the device cost. It feels like a no brainer to the consumer; make the GPU larger and just price the phone $30 or $50 higher, right?
But the only thing that got better was GPU performance. RAM & memory stayed the same, energy efficiency stayed mostly the same, the screen is the same, and on… but now it has to compare to other devices with $50 more on its price tag.
In general, Mediatek devices have a good radio & ISP on their midline chips, and their chips can be cheaper overall for a given level of performance. They also tend to have better cache and memory performance for a given RAM chip.