I was absolutely blown away earlier this year by Qualcomm's Snapdragon X2 platform after spending a month with Lenovo's Slim 7x (Gen 11). The System-on-Chip (SoC) was fast and efficient on or off the charger, and it came in a sleek 14-inch package.
A new commissioned study from the independent testing group Signal65 has basically confirmed my arguments, this time after testing the flagship X2 Elite Extreme (X2E-96-100) variant in retail systems you or I can buy.
Here's the main blurb from the whitepaper's key findings:
The Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme delivers the highest CPU and AI performance we have measured in a premium thin and light Windows laptop, holds that lead in the out-of-box Balanced mode and on battery, and does it at a lower retail price than its closest Intel competitor.
Signal65
This sentence alone might not be telling you anything new, especially if you've experienced the X2 Elite Extreme firsthand. But let me break down the findings to explain a bit better what Signal65 dug up.
Qualcomm's Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme goes up against Intel and AMD
Signal65 tested the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme against the Intel Core Ultra X9 388H and AMD Ryzen AI 9 465 laptop CPUs. These are two of the latest chips from each company, found today in thin and light Windows laptops.
Testing the chips in Geekbench 7, Signal65 found the X2 Elite Extreme to be "up to 53% faster" than Intel's chip and "up to 83% faster" than AMD's chip.
In Cinebench 2026, which is used to test multi-thread rendering performance, the X2 Elite Extreme was "up to 87% faster" than the Intel and AMD chips.
What's even more impressive is that Signal65 separately tested the X2 Elite Extreme on battery power with the Balanced Windows power profile. With the Intel and AMD systems plugged in and set to Best Performance, the X2 Elite Extreme still outperformed the competing chips in all AI and CPU benchmarks.
Besides raw CPU power, the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme also outperformed its rivals in the Neural Processing Unit (NPU) arena. Qualcomm's specialized chip that runs AI locally almost hit 2x the AI performance compared to Intel, climbing to about 2.4x the performance of AMD's NPU in the Procyon AI Computer Vision test.
It's well worth noting that the X2 Elite Extreme's Hexagon NPU hits 80 TOPS, compared to 50 TOPS in the Intel and AMD chips. This might explain some performance discrepancy, but not to this extent.
Rumors of the X2 Elite Extreme's power were not exaggerated
In February 2026, I covered early testing from Hardware Canucks that showed how the non-Extreme X2 Elite chip beat Apple's M5 in three major tests. These tests were performed using a sample/reference unit from Qualcomm itself.
In March 2026, we got an early look at what Qualcomm had cooked up with its X2 Elite Extreme. Leaked Geekbench 6 performance results showed that the Snapdragon chip could trounce the Core Ultra X9 388H, boding well for its competition against Intel's Panther Lake generation.
To say I had high hopes for Snapdragon X2 is fair, and I'm glad to see that performance in actual laptops you or I can buy hasn't dropped off compared to early reference systems.
A few things to consider when poring over Signal65's data
This report from Signal65 was commissioned by Qualcomm, but there's no reason for me to think that any of the numbers were fudged. Signal65 is independent and generally credible.
There's also the fact that these chips were tested in three different laptops from three different manufacturers.
For the test, Signal65 used an ASUS Zenbook A16 (X2 Elite Extreme), an MSI Prestige 16 (Intel Core Ultra), and an HP OmniBook X 16 (AMD Ryzen. Three 16-inch laptops ranging between $1,649 and $2,299.
Because of OEM-level decisions for cooling and power, the different laptops could affect the results. However, I don't think it would affect them enough to sway the paper's overall thesis.
It's also worth pointing out that Intel still leads the way with its integrated Arc B390 graphics, at least in Signal65's tests. It also bested Snapdragon in one Office battery rundown test.
As for value, the $1,699 Zenbook A16 with X2 Elite Extreme is only bested by the $1,649 OmniBook X 16 with AMD Ryzen. Intel might beat Qualcomm in graphics and in one battery rundown test, but the MSI Prestige 16 in which it was tested costs $2,299.
Qualcomm is not only delivering superior performance and battery life, but it's also delivering laptops at a better price than its competition.
Windows Central's take
Qualcomm's first-gen Snapdragon X chips are really what changed the Windows on ARM conversation after so many years. They weren't good enough to get everyone to drop Intel and AMD, but they were a solid foundation.
And now, with Snapdragon X2, Qualcomm has evidently stepped things up in a major way. If you've used a laptop with an X2 chip, you probably already know exactly what I'm talking about.
Have you had a different experience with your Snapdragon X2 PC? What's your main gripe? On the other hand, what do you love most about your X2 PC? Let me know in the comments section below!
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