MediaTek Dimensity 9000 Plus launched: Its power level is (technically) over 9000

The MediaTek Dimensity 9000 was a landmark release for the company as it was a full-blown rival to the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. Now, just a month after Qualcomm announced the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, the Taiwanese chipmaker has announced a mid-year refresh of its own in the form of the Dimensity 9000 Plus.

The upgraded processor differs from the Dimensity 9000 by offering a 5% clock speed increase for the Cortex-X2 heavyweight core, going from 3.05GHz to 3.2GHz. MediaTek adds that the GPU has also received a 5% clock speed boost (and a graphical performance improvement of over 10%), although it refused to disclose specific clock speeds for both the existing Dimensity 9000 and the new Plus model. 

Otherwise, this is the same chipset as the standard Dimensity 9000. That means you’re getting a 4nm TSMC design as well as an octacore CPU consisting of one Cortex-X2 core, three Cortex-A710 cores, and four Cortex-A510 cores.

You’re also getting familiar core features like a Mali-G710 MC10 GPU, an integrated 5G modem topping out at 7Gbps (albeit lacking mmWave connectivity), and a fifth-generation APU for machine learning.

Will we actually see it in global markets?

Other specs worth knowing include 320MP single-camera support, AV1 decoding support, simultaneous triple camera HDR video recording, 8K/24fps recording, a 144Hz refresh rate at WQHD+ resolution, 180Hz refresh rate at FHD+ resolution, Bluetooth 5.3, and Wi-Fi 6E.

MediaTek says phones with the Dimensity 9000 Plus are set to launch in Q3 2022. OPPO, vivo, and Xiaomi all launched Dimensity 9000 phones earlier this year, but only the vivo device (the vivo X80) was available outside China. So we wonder whether any Dimensity 9000 Plus phones will be available in global markets, especially with the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 being a more significant mid-year refresh for Qualcomm than we’ve seen in years.