Arm Cortex-X5 Leak: Poised to Surpass Apple in Galaxy S25

A recent report from industry research firm Moor Insights and Strategy suggests that the forthcoming iteration of Arm Cortex CPU cores is positioned to emerge as the most potent CPU architecture for smartphones to date. The current flagship large-core design, the Cortex-X4, is expected to be succeeded by the next-generation Cortex-X5 architecture, codenamed "Blackhawk."

Insider information indicates that the "Blackhawk" core is slated to make its debut in smartphones launching later this year or beyond, with strong indications pointing to its potential inclusion in the Samsung Galaxy S25 series. The Samsung-manufactured Exynos 2500 SoC chip is anticipated to leverage a cutting-edge 3nm manufacturing process, featuring the Cortex-X5 large core.

In the competitive landscape of mobile System-on-Chips (SoCs), Apple's proprietary A-series chips have consistently led in single-core performance. The A17 Pro chip, powering the iPhone 15 Pro series, boasts a Geekbench 6 single-core score of 2980, surpassing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen3 by approximately 27% (equipped with a 3.30GHz Cortex-X4 large core). Leaks and industry insights suggest that the upcoming Cortex-X5 is poised to surpass Apple in single-core performance for the first time. Arm's strategic objective is to narrow the performance gap between its official processor architecture and customized Arm platforms. The "Blackhawk" core stands out as achieving the most significant year-over-year increase in IPC (Instructions Per Cycle) performance in the last five years, while also delivering noteworthy Large Language Model (LLM) performance.

Recent reports propose the possibility of the Galaxy S25 featuring two distinct SoC chips. The Exynos 2500 is expected to integrate the Cortex-X5 CPU core, while the Snapdragon 8 Gen4 is projected to adopt Qualcomm's in-house Oryon CPU core, providing performance on par with Apple. Additionally, the MediaTek Dimensity 9400 is anticipated to incorporate three Cortex-X5 large cores. Consequently, around the year 2025, expectations are set for Android smartphones to outperform the Apple iPhone 16 Pro in single-core benchmark scores.