OnePlus launched its flagship smartphone, the OnePlus 10T, in August of this year. interestingly, when the device was launched, rumors suggested that it was the company’s last flagship phone for some time, hinting that the company might not come out with another product in the same class in the near future. Now that plan seems to have changed, with reports suggesting the launch of the OnePlus 11 (or 11 Pro, according to some rumors) – which could happen as early as the end of this year.
Revealed by a source on Chinese social media platform Weibo’s Digital Gossip Station, the company may be working on a new smartphone that will feature a next-generation flagship chip from chipmaker Qualcomm. The chipset, known internally as the Qualcomm SM8550, is expected to be the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 – the successor to the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 currently used in most high-end phones, including the OnePlus 10T itself.
Unfortunately, so far there isn’t much else to say about the upcoming OnePlus 11, or the next-generation Qualcomm chip either. The latter is expected to be a 4nm chip. in June, it was reported that Samsung Semiconductor would start the mass production process for Qualcomm’s 3nm chip, but given that these chips are expected to be available to handset makers as early as November, it’s unlikely that production of the 3nm chip will begin before the end of 2022.
Therefore, it remains to be seen whether Snapdragon Gen 2 Gen 8 makes a big leap in performance over its predecessor, or remains an iterative upgrade. The current flagship has been a reliable performer, and it is now used in almost all high-performance flagship smartphones.
The report further notes that Xiaomi could be the first OEM to launch a smartphone based on the new Snapdragon chip, but OnePlus could follow suit with the OnePlus 11 soon after.
