Qualcomm's own chief executive confirmed on 29 July 2026 what hardware partners had already been told in a letter five days earlier: Snapdragon chip prices are going up by double digits from 1 September, and phones running that chip will cost more because of it. For Malaysian buyers eyeing a flagship upgrade later this year, the brand on the box matters less than the chip inside it.
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Kai T chevron_right
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What Qualcomm Confirmed
According to Bloomberg's reporting, corroborated by Digitimes, 9to5Google, TechRepublic and Notebookcheck, Qualcomm sent a customer letter to hardware partners on 24 July stating it could no longer absorb rising supplier costs, after first trying and failing to source components from alternative vendors. On the company's fiscal Q3 2026 earnings call on 29 July, chief executive Cristiano Amon put it plainly to CNBC: "Cost went up, prices are going to go up." Qualcomm has not disclosed the exact percentage, only that it is double digits, and has tied the increase to broad-based cost inflation across wafer fabrication, memory, assembly and advanced packaging.
The reach of this is wide. Snapdragon powers most premium Android phones on the market today, including flagships from Samsung, Xiaomi and OnePlus, plus a growing range of wearables and Windows-on-Snapdragon laptops.
What It Means for a Malaysian Buyer
Snapdragon sits at the top of Malaysia's phone shelf. The Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra, priced at RM6,799 on a Snapdragon 8 Gen 4, is exactly the kind of device that will feel this first once the new 2nm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro ships in phones later this year.
But most of what Malaysians actually buy below the flagship tier runs a different chip entirely. The Redmi Note 15 Pro+ (RM1,599) and the Vivo V70 (RM1,999) both run MediaTek's Dimensity silicon, not Qualcomm's, and that is where the escape hatch sits. MediaTek's answer to Qualcomm's new 2nm flagship chip, the Dimensity 9600 Pro, is reported at roughly USD216 to chipmakers, around 28% cheaper than the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro it competes against, according to supply-chain sourcing reported by WCCFTech. Brands facing a Qualcomm surcharge now have a materially cheaper 2nm alternative sitting right next to it, and industry reporting already points to Oppo and Vivo weighing the MediaTek chip for their next flagships instead.
For a Malaysian shopper, that gap is the practical takeaway. A flagship phone announced from September onward is more likely to hold its price if it runs MediaTek, and more likely to carry the increase if it runs Snapdragon.
The Bigger Squeeze
Qualcomm is not raising prices in isolation. Component and memory costs have been climbing industry-wide through 2026, and TechRadar's own coverage this month notes rising memory chip costs already pushing Xiaomi to raise prices across its device lineup, independent of anything Qualcomm-specific. Qualcomm and MediaTek are also racing each other on the same third-quarter 2026 timeline with competing 2nm chips, which means the price gap between the two is shaping up to be one of the more important ways phone brands actually compete on cost next year, ahead of camera specs or screen size.
Takeaway
If a Malaysian buyer is planning next year's flagship upgrade, the chip inside the box, not just the brand on the back, will decide how much of Qualcomm's price hike actually reaches their wallet.
