Galaxy S25 Ultra New Cooling System Tested: Does it beat the iPhone 16 Pro Max and OnePlus 13?

If we had to name the biggest upgrade in the Galaxy S25 Ultra, we would say it's the new Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset inside it, with no hesitation. This is the first time we see a 3nm chip on the Android flagship, and the expectations are sky high. But with all this increased power, Samsung is facing a challenge: it has to be able to cool down the processor well, so that it does not overheat. In order to do this, Samsung says it has a 40% larger vapor chamber for cooling in the S25 Ultra compared to the S24 Ultra. Is that enough? Let's find out. GPU stress test We use the popular 3D Mark benchmark (specifically, the Wildlife Extreme Stress Test). While other gaming benchmarks give you just the initial performance, this one runs for 20 minutes and you can see how the performance changes as the chip heats up. So this kind of usage is more true to life and gives you the full picture. While the S25 Ultra starts on a high note reaching some 6,200 points on the test and beating rivals like the iPhone 16 Pro Max, you notice that just after three or four minutes, the performance drops significantly because of thermal throttling.

In fact, the performance line flattens out at around 3,000 points, half the initial score. This is definitely disappointing. Rival OnePlus 13 uses the same Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset and it has a similar initial score, but its line flattens at a much higher score of nearly 4,500 points. This is 50% higher prolonged performance compared to the Galaxy S25 Ultra!