I saw how Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X series outperforms Intel CPUs — and I’m blown away by the difference

Qualcomm has rounded up its lineup of AI-powered Snapdragon X series chips with its announcement of the Snapdragon X, making Copilot+ PCs more affordable. Today, the company showed off the performance of its CPUs compared to Intel Lunar Lake devices, and there's a huge difference in performance.

During a demo at CES 2025, Qualcomm gave us a taste of various NPU-powered features Snapdragon X series PCs could do. Most notably, however, the company weighed up the difference in performance, battery, and price of its chips agasint Intel — and it didn't hold back.

According to Geekbench scores from Qualcomm, the Snapdragon model scored 2408 on single-core and 14,129 on multi-core, while the Intel model only had 1,250 single-core and 6,760 multi-core. Clearly, there's a better model here.

As pointed out by a spokesperson, the Snapdragon X Elite also offers a 90% performance increase over Intel Core Ultra 7 Series 2 chips when unplugged, with both machines running on the default Balanced mode. Apparently, this is due to Intel's NPU cores not being as efficient, and this is also taxing on a device's battery life and cooling.

We've noted the differences in chipsets before, as I tested the Acer Swift 14 AI with Intel Lunar Lake and Snapdragon, with the latter being the clear winner. In the demo shown, Qualcomm offered a side-by-side comparison of a Dell XPS 13 with Snapdragon X Elite and an Intel Core Ultra 9 288V.

While I'm not too surprised by the scores Qualcomm boasted, it's the more affordable Snapdragon X chip that will be the CPU to look out for, especially if it offers performance gains over Intel's chips. Unfortunately, these results weren't shown off, but its AI capabilities are still impressive.

Qualcomm also gave us a look at different NPU-powered software in action, with music being a focus, allowing users to isolate vocals and different instruments instantly in YouTube videos.

The Snapdragon X series could also simulate sounds for different instruments in real time with little-to-no latency. More impressively, this can be done using the lower-end Snapdragon X chip, meaning this AI software can be used in devices ranging from $600.

More NPU-powered experiences are set to arrive, too, including multiple apps such as Zoom, Blender, Cephable, Capture One, djay Pro and plenty more.

While Qualcomm's Snapdragon X series chips continue to impress, Intel Core Ultra 200H and HX Series chips have arrived, and their performance looks promising.

Once we get our hands on Snapdragon X-powered machines (such as the recently announced Lenovo mini PCs), we'll have a better idea of how Qualcomm compares to its competition in our testing. In the meantime, check out the very best of CES 2025.

More from Tom's Guide

• Snapdragon X chip unveiled at CES 2025 for more affordable Copilot+ laptops and even mini PCs — what we know so far
• The 7 best laptops of CES 2025 (so far)
• Intel Core Ultra 200H and HX Series chips are here — everything you need to know