16nm Huawei Kirin 950 launched in Beijing, here are the full specifications


huawei kirin 950

The processor that aims to take on Qualcomm and Samsung while possibly driving the Huawei Mate 8 has just been officially announced. Keep reading for full Huawei Kirin 950 specifications.

Huawei are soon to launch the Huawei Mate 8 and one of the reasons it has taken longer than expected for them to do so is the Huawei Kirin 950 chip. For years now Huawei have developed their own processors to drive certain models in their range, and most recently we are seeing the Chinese tech giant use Kirin chipset in their high-end models.

The Kirin 950 was officially unveiled in Beijing today and comes with all the hardware we expect to see in a flagship SoC.

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The processor is an octacore unit built on 16nm architecture, meaning a smaller, more compact and more efficient chipset. The octacore SoC is set up as a big.LITTLE processor meaning that not all 8 cores are running at once and instead the chip will switch from the little 4 x 1.8Ghz A53 cores to the big 2.53Ghz A72 cores when you begin to push an the accelerator and need more power (like when running high-end games for example).

Huawei have also built a Mali T880MP4 GPU in to the SoC, and Cat 6 LTE modem, and say that with updates to the design and performance, the Kirin 950 can offer unto 10 hours more battery life when used in a phone with 3500mAh battery under ‘normal’ conditions.

Other interesting features include a tiny i5 processing core that is set to always be active for running sensors (barometers etc), and improved voice quality over LTE.

So the take home points are the Huawei Kirin 950 is a faster, more efficient processor, and it is likely going to take up a permanent home in the Huawei Mate 8 later this month! Keep posted for more news.

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21 Comments

  1. KingPopZ
    November 5, 2015

    Lol weak gpu once again! The helio x30 will trash it to death! 😀

    • November 5, 2015

      But the Helio X30 will take months to come. Even phones with the X20 is not yet released. BY the way, the GPU is not weak. Check out the performance of the Mali T760 MP2 in the MT6752. Then compare it with the T880 MP4 and tell me its a weak GPU.

      You should do some research before posting gibberish.

      • Manu
        November 5, 2015

        yep also consider kirin 960 by the time x30 comes out p10 vs 950 would be the current thing^^

        • Maximiliano On Line
          November 5, 2015

          Error, the current thing is x20 vs kirin 950

          • Manu
            November 6, 2015

            my bad ;P

      • KingPopZ
        November 5, 2015

        http://kyokojap.myweb.hinet.net/gpu_gflops/

        Check the gpu gflops from the above link… I do agree that Mali 880 is powerful but the reason why I said it’s weak is that it has only 4 cores. It’s performance must be similar or slightly better than the gpu in sd801. In real life (as you said with the mali760 gpu in mt6752) you may not notice much difference. Huawei should have just added more cores.

        • Guest
          November 5, 2015

          Yeah I agree with you. It’ll be better for future proofing. After all Huawei markets its mate 8 as a flagship so it doesn’t make any sense having a weak GPU.

        • November 5, 2015

          You didnt realize that more cores could mean more power consumption? Besides, its not just all about GFlops. I doubt anyone, including you KingPopZ, will be able to task the Mali T880 MP4 to its full prowess.

          So, this rant about a weak GPU doesnt make any sense to me. Its just for bragging rights. Nothing more or less.

          • KingPopZ
            November 5, 2015

            Lol, that’s really funny. Having more cores doesn’t mean that it is going to be utilized all the time. And so it doesn’t affect the battery life as you think. However, during heavy usage such as high end gaming, it might consume considerably more power but that’s worth the extra speed gain. Wait till technical reviews prove you wrong. And thank god that Huawei didn’t pair the Mate 8 with a 2k display or else gaming would have been a nightmare.

            • Fox Hunter
              November 5, 2015

              No one does high end gaming on a smartphone, that is what consoles are for.

        • Guaire
          November 5, 2015

          *Facepalm*

          It will trash out Adreno 330 in real life performance AND at benchmarks for sure.

          It probably gonna be twice as fast in reality.

    • Rob
      November 5, 2015

      Not sure how the x30 will trash it to death as you put it since it will be running the same gpu! Only thing we don’t know is the clock speed, but I agree they should’ve used an mp6 variant at the very least. However if you want really powerful graphics then the high end snapdragons are the way to go since they are the only chip that try to put in a powerful graphics core.

      • Guest
        November 5, 2015

        True. But even the Exynos 8890 could end up having a powerful GPU. Recent “Leaked” benchmarks show that the Exynos 8890 is the most powerful CPU in the android device market. Thus Huawei Mate 8 could get outdated very soon to an Top Tier mid-ranger.

        • Rob
          November 5, 2015

          I completely agree as Samsung would likely use an mp8 variant of this gpu and their custom cpu core looks like it will be more powerful than that of the SD820. I was looking forward to the mate 8 as my next phone, pricing will be key here but I feel they are gonna put a ridiculous price tag on it like all their phones this year. Think the vivo X6 is going to be the biggest surprise this year as it sounds awesome (and I really want it)!

          • Guest
            November 5, 2015

            The Vivo X6 sounds like a complete beast! Hope the rumoured specs are true!

            • Rob
              November 5, 2015

              If they are true and it is announced next week it will be winging it’s way into my hands very rapidly! Been without a phone too long.

          • Faux-News
            November 5, 2015

            From experience Mate 8 will surely not be cheap as that you should expect on Honor series (The K950 will be used on Honor 7 plus), and will be priced at least the cost of Mate S.

            Was a huge fan of Vivo Xplay 3s when it was released, but now although the leaks of Vivo X6 does make it sound a worthy successor, but the UI which they barely made any worthy updates since Xplay3s would be a let down. Also note it won’t be easy to buy X6 while Mate 8 should be on stores by December-January

    • MattD
      November 5, 2015

      While i do agree that more gpu cores would have been fitting for a flagship device, and i really don’t understand why huawei always trash up his socs in the gpu department, i really can’t say it’s “weak”.
      We always tend to overlook to benchmark department and underlook what really matter, the everyday use!
      Judging what it turns out so far, the mali t880mp4 should have about the same performance of mali t760mp8… And i don’t really think gs6’s gpu is weak, since, benchmark wise, it’s better than the andreno’s counterpart!
      Surely kirin socs are not going to win the antutu top ten next year, but it’s not like they will not have enough power to drive you through the day by every means (and probably, they will drive you longer than exynos and snapdragon, since huawei really puts efford in power and temperature efficiency, more than brnchmarks)

      • Guaire
        November 5, 2015

        Only reason is cost.

  2. MattD
    November 5, 2015

    Why did they had to mention a “3500mah battery” to make an example? Am i the only one thinking something’s fishy here?! Did they just set up to say “mate 8 will have a smaller 3500mah battery in comparison with mate 7, but don’t worry, it will last longer!”?!

  3. Fox Hunter
    November 5, 2015

    Goodbye Qualcom