New Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 leak hints at a key spec for the iPad rival

Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 series
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 series (Image credit: Samsung)

We're getting a host of new iPads this year after a pause in 2023, but Samsung has some premium tablets of its own in the pipeline – and a new specs leak may have just revealed the most important component in the upcoming Galaxy Tab S10 series.

According to seasoned tipster @UniverseIce, all the tablets in the 2024 range are going to come packing a MediaTek Dimensity 9300 Plus chipset. This would be a slight upgrade on the standard Dimensity 9300 CPU, which was announced in May.

It's something of a surprise because almost all of the previous Galaxy Tab slates have run on Qualcomm Snapdragon silicon – the only exception being the original Galaxy Tab S from 2014, which had one of Samsung's own Exynos processors inside.

As you'll see from our Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra review, the 2023 tablets come with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset inside. While the latest Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 appears in the Galaxy S24 series in some regions, Samsung has apparently decided against it for its tablets, most probably to keep costs down.

Power to the people

While Qualcomm chips are widely regarded to beat out MediaTek and Exynos in raw performance terms most of the time, according to the source of this leak the MediaTek Dimensity 9300 Plus remains a "very good performer."

In benchmarks on the web, the Mediatek chip actually comes out slightly ahead in certain categories, though synthetic benchmarks don't always tell the full story when it comes to real-world performance inside actual devices.

It brings up the perennial question – often asked in relation to Apple's most expensive iPads – of how much power a tablet really needs. The Galaxy Tab S10 series may switch from Snapdragon, but they'll still be very speedy tablets.

As for when we might see these devices – most probably the Tab S10, the Tab S10 Plus, and the Tab S10 Ultra – they should show up soon, considering their predecessors were unveiled in August 2023. Watch this space.

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David Nield
Freelance Contributor

Dave is a freelance tech journalist who has been writing about gadgets, apps and the web for more than two decades. Based out of Stockport, England, on TechRadar you'll find him covering news, features and reviews, particularly for phones, tablets and wearables. Working to ensure our breaking news coverage is the best in the business over weekends, David also has bylines at Gizmodo, T3, PopSci and a few other places besides, as well as being many years editing the likes of PC Explorer and The Hardware Handbook.