Bad news from Galaxy S23 series benchmark results? Leaker suspects issues with heat

We are getting closer and closer to the official release of the Galaxy S23 series. Rumors and leaks have suggested the flagship trio by Samsung are going to come with an overclocked Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor, which should in theory mean the three phones should be faster than a phone sporting a regular 8 Gen 2. Well, reputable leaker IceUniverse is now casting some doubt on that expectation… with Geekbench results.

The Galaxy S23’s supposedly overclocked Qualcomm 8 Gen 2 is not performing as well as one’d expect

The leaker has shared all of the entries that came from the Galaxy S23 on Geekbench so far, and the numbers are a bit, let’s say, disappointing. Well, the single-core results are on par with other phones sporting the 8 Gen 2, but there’s something curious happening with the multi-core results…

As Ice points out, there’s no result that goes over the 5,000 mark from the S23. And that’s bad just because the processor is expected to be an overclocked version of the 8 Gen 2. As you can see in the images, other phones that come with the regular 8 Gen 2 are able to reach higher numbers on multi-core.

Basically, this somewhat undermines the fact that the processor’s supposed to be a special version just for the S23 phones. One would assume an overclocked processor will be able to reach higher speeds. In fact, Ice believes there could be some throttling going on. According to the leaker’s speculation, the S23 may be hindering its performance when it heats up – and he believes this is due to Samsung cutting some corners in order to save on the pricing. He says that heat sinks are reduced (heat sinks are responsible for keeping the phone relatively cold even when its chip is operating at full power, basically, to prevent overheating).

If that’s the case, it is possible the Galaxy S23 series could be a bit underwhelming when it comes to this special 8 Gen 2 chip they are going to get.

There are a few important aspects of this that we should address though. Geekbench results don’t necessarily reflect real-life experiences with a given phone or device. Most probably the regular user won’t be able to tell the difference let’s say between a 4800 score and a 5100 score. Nevertheless, one is for certain – everyone would expect upgrades and everyone would expect the S23 phones to be at least on par with the competition (especially if the competition is running the same chip, but with a SLOWER clock speed).

And yet another thing that we should mention and take into consideration when talking about this. IceUniverse was the leaker who previously talked about an ‘exclusive’ 8 Gen 2 chip the S23 would run. First of all, it’s important to remember that nothing is official before it is official. Meaning, when we see the S23 officially released, that’s when we’ll know for sure what’s true and what isn’t. And second of all, Ice previously mentioned the special 8 Gen 2 chip could be available only for European versions of the S23.

It is unclear which version the above Geekbench tests were run with (European, US?). But with all that being said, these Geekbench results do cast some doubts on the performance of the Galaxy S23 series.

Other things we’ve heard so far on the S23 series include the possible release date of the phone, which could be set for February 1st, and a 200MP main camera on the Galaxy S23 Ultra. Refinements in the design are expected, as well as improvements across the board. One last reminder – we’ll know all these things for certain when Samsung unveils its 2023 flagship series. Before that – we’re left biting our nails (and hoping for good news!).