A YouTube channel conducted a battery test with two versions of the Galaxy S26. Same phone, same tasks, same conditions, but the only difference was the chip inside. The difference? Turns out it was worth almost three hours of screen time.
Android Addicts ran a battery test with two Galaxy S26 devices side by side: one with Exynos 2600 (available in some Asian markets) and the other with the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 (available in the US).
How bad is it?
The channel performed identical tasks on the phones, including calling, 4K video recording, navigation, streaming, gaming benchmarks and social media usage. Although it is not necessary to perform all of these tasks on a smartphone every day, such tests usually put a lot of strain on the device and drain the battery.
To achieve the best possible results, Wi-Fi was switched off and 5G was active on both phones at all times. The result? The Snapdragon-equipped S26 lasted 9 hours and 26 minutes, while the Exynos variant lasted 6 hours and 48 minutes – a difference of almost 28%, or two and a half hours in real-world usage.
The Exynos-powered Galaxy S26 didn’t even make it into the Instagram and Amazon Prime Video segment of the battery test, so the Snapdragon unit was used.
Why does Samsung’s own chip lose to Qualcomm’s?
The short answer: heat and hunger. The Exynos 2600 chip consumes about 30W under peak load, which is about 40% more than the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5’s 21W ceiling at nearly the same multi-core performance.
These power spikes generate heat that harms the chipset’s efficiency, and the resulting drop in efficiency increases battery consumption. During video encoding, especially on the Exynos-powered Galaxy S26, it began to overheat, further reducing runtime.
To be fair, the Exynos 2600 still boasts of being the world’s first 2nm GAA chip. For now, however, it looks like the badge is more suitable for marketing than actual, real-world performance.
The difference does not affect Galaxy S26 buyers in the US. However, for people in other markets (like me), the battery drain test is painful and highlights the gap that still exists between Samsung and Qualcomm’s latest smartphone processors.
