In January, Samsung's Galaxy S23 lineup launched with an exclusive version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. This Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for the Galaxy offered improved performance over the base chip, giving Samsung an advantage, but the company may not be able to maintain its exclusivity for long.

RedMagic confirmed on Chinese social network Weibo that the upcoming RedMagic 8S Pro will feature a chip called the "Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 Leading Version." The chip is reportedly set to offer a clock speed of 3.36 GHz, which is the same as the Galaxy variant, surpassing the 3.32 GHz clock speed of the regular Gen 2 chip.

In other words, it seems quite likely that this is a rebranded version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy. This is because the RedMagic 8S Pro is not a Galaxy smartphone.

It makes sense that RedMagic would want to put such a chip in the 8S Pro. This is a gaming smartphone with 24GB of RAM and will clearly benefit from the faster processing and graphics offered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 (the leading version, if you prefer to call it that) for Galaxy.

Our own benchmark tests show that the Galaxy Gen 2 variant is truly superior to the A16 Bionic chipset found in the standard model and the iPhone 14 Pro Max.

The Galaxy S23 scored 1,522 single-core and 4,876 multi-core in Geekbench 5. Meanwhile, the iPhone 14 Pro Max recorded 1,882 and 5,333, and the OnePlus 11 (with standard Gen 2 chip) recorded 1,166 and 4,962.

It is also worth noting that the RedMagic 8 Pro, the predecessor to the upcoming 8S Pro, recorded 1,496 and 5,217 on Geekbench 5. These multicore scores exceeded those of the Galaxy S23, despite being powered by a standard Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip. This means that the 8S Pro could theoretically push these numbers even higher with a faster chip, and could even surpass the A16 Bionic's multi-core score.

RedMagic may not be the only company looking to add an overclocked Gen 2 chip to its phones. Leaks last month suggested that Asus, OnePlus, Xiaomi, and others are hoping to add the chip to their phones.

Given rumors that the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 2 may not launch this year, a rebranded Galaxy model may be the next best thing. Although rumors speculate an early introduction of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, which could be even faster than the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy.

We will have to see how this plays out in the coming months and which phones might take advantage of Samsung's loss of exclusivity. In the meantime, the RedMagic 8S Pro is scheduled to launch in China on July 5, and we will no doubt hear more about the phone's performance then.