MediaTek Helio G36 launched with basically no upgrades

Nowadays, most of the new smartphones are coming with 5G. However, there is still a good portion of users that prefer to buy cheaper 4G smartphones. Apart from the price, not all users have a need for a 5G phone right now, as the network is still penetrating some countries and regions. For that reason, there are still a lot of companies launching 4G phones, and the chipmakers still have an offer of 4G chipsets. Qualcomm is seriously reducing its offer of 4G chips, and MediaTek wants to keep exploring this segment. Today, the Taiwanese chipmaker launched a new 4G chipset dubbed Helio G36. As the name suggests, this chip sits below the current Helio G37 and apparently is here just to fill a schedule.

Helio G36 specifications

The new Helio G36 is not a significant upgrade, in fact, some will say it’s worse than the Helio G37. It seems that MediaTek will sell this chipset as its latest offering, and will slowly ditch the G37. The Helio G36 comes with a 100 Mhz clock reduction on its Cortex-A53 cores. The CPU now operates at 2.2 GHz instead of 2.3 GHz. The core design is old, and the manufacturing process is too. It boasts MediaTek’s fave 12nm process. Which has been a trademark for the Helio G-series, except for the newer Helio G99, which boasts a 6nm manufacturing process.

The Helio G36 comes with an IMG PowerVR GE8320 GPU which should be enough for moderate gaming. This CPU can handle 90 Hz displays which is an advantage over the lesser Helio G25 or G35. It can handle up to Full HD+ resolution. Other features include the HyperThread 2.0 Engine for gaming, Wi-Fi 5, Bluetooth 5.0, and support for 50 MP cameras.

The Helio G36 clearly is an offering to power low-end smartphones. It will probably sell at cheaper margins, allowing the OEMs to bring it with phones under the $150 price tag. The first phones with it are set to appear in the coming months.