A fresh leak suggests Xiaomi is preparing a major architectural shake-up for its next in-house mobile chip, with the upcoming XRING O3 reportedly lined up as the silicon platform for the Mix Fold 5.
According to the source report, the chip appeared in Xiaomi code databases under the codename “lhasa.” The same report says it is currently expected to debut inside the Mix Fold 5, a foldable phone identified internally as Q18, and that the model is presently aimed at the China market only.
What stands out most is the claimed CPU redesign. Compared with the earlier XRING O1 used in the Xiaomi 15S Pro, the new chip is said to move away from the older four-cluster layout and adopt a more aggressive three-cluster structure built around a Prime core, Titanium cores, and Little cores.
The leak claims the Prime core can push past the 4GHz mark to reach 4.05GHz, while the Titanium performance cores may run at 3.42GHz. The report also says Xiaomi has dropped the traditional Big cluster entirely in this generation, which would be a meaningful shift in how the company balances performance and efficiency.
Another striking detail involves the efficiency cores. The source says the Little cores could reach 3.02GHz, versus 1.79GHz on the prior generation, which would represent roughly a 68% increase in clock speed. On the graphics side, the GPU is said to approach 1.5GHz, up from 1.2GHz on XRING O1, or about a 25% gain.
Memory bandwidth may stay unchanged at 9600 MT/s, based on the report, but that would still keep the chip in top-tier territory if Xiaomi can maintain the same power envelope. The article argues that faster low-power cores could help background task handling and multitasking, which matters on a large-screen foldable device.
There is still a lot of uncertainty here. The source publication speculates Xiaomi could use a 1+3+4 or 1+2+5 core arrangement, and it also floated a possible launch price of around $1,500 for the phone. None of that has been officially confirmed, so for now the bigger takeaway is that Xiaomi appears to be experimenting with a very different Xiaomi chipset strategy for its next foldable.
