The first quarter of 2026 has officially wrapped up, and Antutu’s March benchmark numbers paint a clear picture of the ongoing silicon wars. If you want top-tier performance right now, the numbers show a tight Android race where specialized engineering is beating out raw specs, and new form factors are refusing to compromise on power.

Top 10 flagship smartphones: The ‘Performance Ultra’ and compact kings

March saw some significant shake-ups in the premium tier, though one trend remains abundantly clear: Qualcomm’s absolute dominance. The chip maker secured nine out of 10 spots on the flagship chart.

While other brands are attaching the “Ultra” moniker to heavy, camera-centric devices, the iQOO 15 Ultra took a different route. Billed as a true “Performance Ultra,” it maximized the potential of the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset to seize the top spot with a commanding average score of 4,174,911.

Coming in hot at No. 2 is the OnePlus 15T. Launching straight onto the charts with 4,164,561 points, this 6.3-inch device shatters the tired industry notion that a smaller footprint requires thermal or processing sacrifices. It proves that compact flagships can hang with the heavyweights.

Rounding out the top three is the vivo X300 Pro Satellite Communication Edition. Armed with the MediaTek Dimensity 9500, it secured 4,081,260 points. What makes this impressive is that vivo achieved this high-end synthetic performance without sacrificing its large camera array, including a 200-megapixel periscope lens. It also holds the distinction of being the lone MediaTek-powered device on the flagship list this month.

Top 10 subflagship smartphones: MediaTek’s undisputed territory

In the sub-flagship space, it’s not even a contest anymore. MediaTek has effectively built a fortress around this tier. The iQOO Z11, powered by the Ultra edition of the Dimensity 8500, dominated the chart with an average score of 2,323,935.

Following closely is the HONOR Power2 with Dimensity 8500 Elite and the OPPO Reno15 Pro with Dimensity 8400-Max. The overarching narrative here is the maturity of the Dimensity 8500 family. By pushing its all-big-core architecture even further, MediaTek is delivering flagship-level speeds at a midrange price point, leaving little room for competitors to breathe in this segment.

Top 10 tablets: A new gaming giant emerges

The tablet market just got a huge jolt of adrenaline. After months of HONOR standing alone at the top, the Lenovo Legion Y700 Gen 5 has dethroned it. Equipped with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 processor and aggressive, gaming-focused thermal scheduling, this 8.8-inch device racked up a staggering 4,068,337 points.

This pushes the former champion, the HONOR MagicPad3 Pro 13.3, into second place with 3,947,547 points. The OPPO Pad 4 Pro sits further down in third with 3,367,909 points. The rise of the new Legion tablet proves that when you pair top-tier Qualcomm silicon with a chassis built specifically to dissipate heat during intense gaming sessions, the performance ceiling gets pushed incredibly high. It also cements another clear win for Qualcomm, which dominated the tablet rankings by claiming seven of the 10 entries on the board.

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