Pixel Phones to use the GPU as in Samsung Global Galaxy

Google’s new Pixel Phones will be available this fall, and there’s a lot to look forward to. According to leaked renders of the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 “Pro,” Google is going in a whole different route with the design, display, and cameras. Under the hood, rumours say that the upcoming Pixel Phones will be powered by Google’s own GS101 silicon, which we’ve confirmed through our own sources as well as an unintended leak in AOSP.

We now know a little more about the chipset that will power the Pixel Phones in 2021, according to yet another unintended leak. We’ve learned that the Pixel 6 will use the same Mali GPU as Samsung’s Exynos-powered Galaxy S21, which is available worldwide. We had assumed that Google’s bespoke silicon project, code-named “whitechapel,” would use an off-the-shelf Mali GPU from ARM when we first heard about it.

A Googler posted an ANGLE logcat captured on a “P21” device in a comment on the Google Issue Tracker, which was identified by tipster @akes29. The Mali-G78 GPU, ARM’s second GPU IP based on the Valhall architecture, is listed as the renderer in the logcat. Although the Mali-G78 can support up to 24 cores, as seen on Huawei’s Mate X2, Samsung’s global Galaxy S21 has a 14-core variation. The number of cores of the Mali-G78 GPU in the Pixel 6 is unknown, as is the maximum frequency of these cores.

However, we now know that Google is planning to use a high-end mobile GPU in its forthcoming Pixels, which means it will be a significant upgrade over the Adreno 620 GPU seen in the Pixel 5. One of the most frustrating elements of Google’s Pixel 5 was its weak GPU performance, but with Android 12’s new gaming mode, the upcoming Pixel 6 could provide a better experience for mobile gamers.