Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 Runs Cyberpunk 2077 on a Smartphone: First Impressions

The YouTube channel ETA PRIME decided to test the capabilities of Qualcomm's latest flagship processor by running one of the most demanding modern games, Cyberpunk 2077, on a Red Magic 11 Pro smartphone with a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip. The experiment clearly demonstrated that mobile gaming has long since outgrown the boundaries of simple casual titles.

To run the PC game, a GameHub emulator was used, allowing the "heavy" title to be adapted for mobile hardware. At 720p resolution with the FSR upscaler enabled in Balance mode, the frame rate remained around 25-30 frames per second, comparable to previous-generation consoles such as the PlayStation 4 or Xbox One.

However, stability depended directly on the complexity of the scene. The smoothest gaming experience was achieved while walking through the deserted nighttime streets of Night City, where the system load is minimal. Enabling FSR Frame Generation allowed the frame rate to increase to 50 frames per second, but this came at the cost of a noticeable reduction in image clarity during fast-paced scenes.

Despite some compromises, the blogger deemed the experiment a success and noted that the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 performed well in a task not typically found on smartphones. He believes that the next generation of chips will likely make Cyberpunk 2077 much more playable.