Your next Windows laptop is even more likely to use the same tech as your phone

Qualcomm has been taking the fight over Windows laptops to AMD and Intel for a couple of years now and has now completed its full complement of second-generation chips with the mid-range Snapdragon X2 Plus introduced at CES 2026 alongside numerous devices from Asus, Lenovo and more.

The company introduced the Snapdragon X2 Elite and X2 Elite Extreme for higher-end laptops at the tail end of last year.

The first generation Snapdragon X Plus chips debuted in September 2024, so Qualcomm certainly isn’t resting as it attempts to build more market share in what is an ultra-competitive market.

The new chips come in two variants – 56 core and 10-core. Both are capable of pushing clockspeeds up to 4GHz and both also have the 80 TOPS Hexagon neural processor from the more powerful chips and use the same third-gen Oryon CPU core. There’s also support for faster memory with a huge 152GB per second of memory bandwidth.

Qualcomm isn’t being drawn on battery life figures, but it promises “multi-day battery life”. It does reckon this is a significant performance improvement on the predecessor tech though, with 35% more CPU performance yet drawing 43% less power. The graphics promise a 29% uplift, while there’s also now support for three 4K displays, too.

The Snapdragon X2 Plus platform supports Wi-Fi 7, 5G cellular and Bluetooth 5.4.

Qualcomm also highlighted some of the work done to make apps run natively on its ARM-based chips, especially from Adobe Creative Suite, Capture One and DaVinci Resolve.

“There was a lot of talk 18 months back about apps and ecosystem compatibility,” said Kedar Kondap, head of Qualcomm’s Compute division.

“The Snapdragon app ecosystem compatibility has now reached a new level of maturity. App developers, peripheral makers and all of our partners are leaning in.

“We’re seeing significant optimizations, not just that, we’re seeing a deeper integration, and a growing recognition that Snapdragon is changing how a mobile-first PC accelerated. We have support for more than 1,800 games now.”

Dan Grabham Editor-in-Chief

About

Dan is Editor-in-chief of Stuff, working across the magazine and the Stuff.tv website.  Our Editor-in-Chief is a regular at tech shows such as CES in Las Vegas, IFA in Berlin and Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as well as at other launches and events. He has been a CES Innovation Awards judge. Dan is completely platform agnostic and very at home using and writing about Windows, macOS, Android and iOS/iPadOS plus lots and lots of gadgets including audio and smart home gear, laptops and smartphones. He's also been interviewed and quoted in a wide variety of places including The Sun, BBC World Service, BBC News Online, BBC Radio 5Live, BBC Radio 4, Sky News Radio and BBC Local Radio.

Areas of expertise

Computing, mobile, audio, smart home