Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme outpaces Intel's Panther Lake by up to 87%

Qualcomm's new Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme (X2E-96-100) is the company's latest flagship laptop processor for premium Windows on Arm devices. With its direct premium Windows laptop competition being Intel's Panther Lake-powered Core Ultra X9 388H and AMD's Ryzen AI 9 465, a new Signal65 study shows the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme outperforming both with ease.

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Granted, Qualcomm sponsored the whitepaper and performance analysis, so even though Signal65 is a well-respected third-party outlet for benchmark data and reporting, the conclusion is that Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme devices offer the best performance per dollar, as they're generally cheaper than their x86 Intel and AMD counterparts.

For its results, the company tested three different retail units: the ASUS Zenbook A16 (X2 Elite Extreme), MSI Prestige 16 (Core Ultra X9 388H), and HP OmniBook X 16 (Ryzen AI 9 465), all priced between $1,649 and $2,299.

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The up to 87% faster Intel Core Ultra X9 388H processor in our headliner comes from the Cinebench 2026 benchmark for content creators, where the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme's multithreaded score came in 87% higher than the Core Ultra X9 and 85% higher than the Ryzen AI 9 465. That lead drops to 24% and 35% in single-thread performance, but it's still an impressive showing.

Before we get into more numbers, here's a quick breakdown of each chip's specs, with the unified memory found in each system.

Geekbench 7, which is another popular CPU benchmark, also saw the X2 Elite Extreme come out ahead. Here, its multi-core score came in 53% higher than the Core Ultra X9 and 83% higher than the Ryzen AI 9 465. Even in the full UL Procyon Office Productivity benchmark, which runs Microsoft 365 apps like Word and Excel, the X2 Elite Extreme outperformed the Core Ultra X9 388H by 16% and the Ryzen AI 9 465 by 20% overall.

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That said, when it comes to the X2 Elite Extreme's integrated Adreno X2-90 graphics card, it does fall short of matching Intel's impressive Arc B390 GPU found inside the Core Ultra X9 388H. Running the 1440p-based Steel Nomad Light synthetic benchmark, which tests modern DirectX 12 and Vulkan APIs, the X2 Elite Extreme falls short by 8% and 12%, respectively. That said, it is notably faster than the AMD Radeon 880M found in the Ryzen AI 9 465, but AMD also offers the more capable Radeon 890M in the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 470.

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Frequently Asked Questions

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Question #1

Which retail laptop models and price range were tested in the Signal65 study for these processors?

The Signal65 study tested three retail laptops: the ASUS Zenbook A16 (Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme), the MSI Prestige 16 (Intel Core Ultra X9 388H), and the HP OmniBook X 16 (AMD Ryzen AI 9 465). These systems were all priced between $1,649 and $2,299.

Answered

Question #2

What are the core counts, maximum boost clocks, and memory configurations listed for each processor in the comparison table?

Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme: 18 cores (12 Oryon Prime + 6 Oryon Performance), max boost 5.0 GHz, 48 GB LPDDR5X memory. Intel Core Ultra X9 388H: 16 cores (4P + 8E + 4LPE), max boost 5.1 GHz, 32 GB LPDDR5X memory. AMD Ryzen AI 9 465: 10 cores (4 Zen 5 + 6 Zen 5c), max boost 5.0 GHz, 32 GB LPDDR5X memory.

Answered

Question #3

How did the X2 Elite Extreme perform in Geekbench 7 multi-core and in the UL Procyon Office Productivity benchmark versus Intel and AMD?

In Geekbench 7 multi-core the X2 Elite Extreme scored 53% higher than Intel’s Core Ultra X9 388H and 83% higher than AMD’s Ryzen AI 9 465. In the full UL Procyon Office Productivity benchmark it outperformed the Core Ultra X9 388H by 16% and the Ryzen AI 9 465 by 20% overall.

Answered

Question #4

Which specific workloads or benchmarks showed the largest performance lead for the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme, and where did it fall short?

The largest leads were in Cinebench 2026 multithreaded (the X2 Elite Extreme scored up to 87% higher than the Intel Core Ultra X9 388H and 85% higher than the Ryzen AI 9 465) and in Geekbench 7 multi-core (53% higher than the Core Ultra X9 and 83% higher than the Ryzen AI 9 465). It also led the UL Procyon Office Productivity suite by 16% over the Core Ultra X9 and 20% over the Ryzen AI 9 465. Where it fell short was graphics: its integrated Adreno X2-90 trailed Intel’s Arc B390 on the 1440p Steel Nomad Light synthetic benchmark by about 8% in DirectX 12 and 12% in Vulkan.

Answered

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Outside of the performance advantage, it's worth noting that Windows on Arm is still in its infancy, relatively speaking, which means there's as much x86 emulation going on as there is native app support. However, with NVIDIA's RTX Spark laptop also set to run Windows on Arm when it debuts later this year, the expectation is that the Windows on Arm experience will keep improving for the foreseeable future.