Qualcomm Teases Next-Gen Snapdragon XR Chipset, Possibly Debuting in Pico’s Next Flagship

Qualcomm seems to be teasing its next-gen Snapdragon XR chipset targeted at standalone headsets, something the company says we’ll learn more about “soon.”

It’s uncertain whether Qualcomm is getting ready to announce its next-gen Snapdragon XR3 platform, or Gen 3 of its previously released XR2 chipset. What is certain though is XR’s biggest chip manufacturer has something new in store, teasing a “new reality” in a short clip posted on X.

And while Qualcomm says we’re due to learn about it “soon,” there’s really no telling when that could be, as the company really hasn’t stuck to a set release schedule for its various XR chip announcements.

Notably, Qualcomm announced Snapdragon XR1 at AWE 2018 in May, Snapdragon XR2 at Snapdragon Tech Summit in December 2019, Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 right before the launch of the Quest 3 in 2023, and Snapdragon XR2+ Gen 2 just before CES 2024.

There are however a few venues the company could announce its next iteration of Snapdragon XR. Qualcomm’s June 24th Investor Relations Day may deliver our first bit of insight into its first slate of hardware partners. There’s also the company’s big Snapdragon Summit in late September, which is notably during the exact same timeframe as Meta Connect.

Thus far, Meta has only teased what appears to be a new slate of smart glasses though, which in the past have integrated Qualcomm’s Snapdragon AR1 chipset. Meta is also seemingly preparing a puck-tethered thin and light standalone, codenamed ‘Phoenix’, although that’s reportedly been delayed to 2027.

Possibly a more likely (and timely) candidate is Pico’s upcoming Project Swan, which the Byte Dance-owned company teased in March to contain a separate flagship SoC with “more than 2× CPU and GPU performance vs XR2 Gen 2.” That’s supposed to launch globally sometime in late 2026, so we may learn a lot more fairly soon.