Samsung offers the Galaxy S26 and the Galaxy S26+ with either the Exynos 2600 or the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy, depending on the region. According to multiple reports, the Exynos 2600 delivers significant improvements over its predecessor, the Exynos 2500, as well as addresses long-standing issues associated with earlier Exynos chipsets, such as overheating, lower power efficiency, and weaker performance compared to Qualcomm’s flagship processors.However, many users remain skeptical about the Exynos 2600’s real-world performance, particularly its power efficiency, fearing that Galaxy S26's variant with this SoC may offer shorter battery life than the variant of the smartphone with the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. Now, a YouTube channel has tested the battery life of both versions of the device — one powered by the Exynos 2600 and the other by Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 — and the results appear to validate those concerns.On YouTube, Android Addicts tested the battery life of both Galaxy S26 variants — one powered by the Exynos 2600 and the other by the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 — by running the same set of tasks on each device. These included phone calls, video calls, Prime Video, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, X, 4K 30FPS video recording, Google Maps navigation, and 3DMark gaming.As you can see in the video below, the Galaxy S26 with the Exynos 2600 lasted six hours and forty-eight minutes (06H:48M), while the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 variant lasted nine hours and twenty-six minutes (09H:26M). In other words, the Qualcomm-powered model ran two hours and thirty-eight minutes (02H:28M) longer, delivering around 28% better battery life than the Exynos version.That said, even though both devices were put through the same set of tasks in the same sequence, the Exynos 2600 still ran out of juice sooner. This suggests that even under more controlled, scientific testing, it would likely continue to trail the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 in battery life, albeit with a smaller gap.