The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hopes to redefine the "smart" in smartphone with a bevy of AI features that touch nearly aspect of the device. Want to type a note in just the right tone? There's Chat Assist in the keyboard. Want to speak to someone in another language? Let Live Translate take over in the phone app. Or you could just circle those sneakers you just saw on TikTok and instantly look them up with Circle to Search.
Throw in a ton of generative AI photo features — including moving subjects around and filling in backgrounds — and it's easy to get overwhelmed. But Samsung deserves credit for making the Galaxy S23 Ultra's AI features fairly intuitive and simple to discover. Just look for a little button with three little magic pixie dust-like animations. If you see that, chances are you can do something cool.
Not so cool is the Galaxy S24 Ultra's $1,299 price. It's $100 more than the Galaxy S23 Ultra and iPhone 15 Pro Max, making it the priciest flagship yet that's not a foldable phone. You also lose the 10x optical zoom from Samsung's previous Ultra, replaced with a less powerful but sharper 50MP 5x telephoto lens.
But Samsung wants to win you over with other upgrades, including a stronger titanium design and a flat display that's insanely bright. Is the Galaxy S24 Ultra the best phone yet? Here's my pros and cons so far after some hands-on time with the phone.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on review: Specs
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: Release date and price
The Galaxy S24 Ultra has a release date of January 31, and it's available for pre-order now. The S24 Ultra pricing starts at a steep $1,299 for 256GB of storage. Other options include 512GB and 1TB.
If you take advantage of Galaxy S24 Ultra preorders, you can get the 512GB model for the price of the 256GB option, and the 1TB model for the 512GB price.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: Design and colors
The Galaxy S24 Ultra has a few important design upgrades you need to know about. First, it uses a titanium frame instead of aluminum, so you get more protection from drops and scratches. Second, the display has 42% slimmer bezels and an 11% slimmer camera.
The result is a design that should be more durable, even if it's about the same weight as the S23 Ultra. The narrower bezels also make the handset narrower and therefore slightly easier to use with one hand than the S23 Ultra, and it's slightly slimmer, too, at 6.40 x 3.11 x 0.34 inches vs 6.4 x 3.0 x 0.35 inches.
The Galaxy S24 Ultra colors are more fun this time around. You can choose from the more tame Titanium Black and Titanium Gray or go for the bolder Titanium Violet and Titanium Yellow. My favorite is the violet option but Yellow is vibrant without being too in your face.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: Display and S Pen
Yes, the curve is gone. Samsung made the Galaxy S24 Ultra's display flat, which many users have been asking for. This makes the S24 Ultra less slippery in the hand and also a better canvas for the S Pen. Just keep in mind that there's no major S Pen upgrades this time around with the exception of being a useful tool for the new Circle to Search feature. (More on that below.)
The bigger Galaxy S24 Ultra display upgrade for me is that the 6.8-inch QHD+ AMOLED panel is searingly bright. The Galaxy S24 Ultra has a rated brightness of 2,600 nits, which is a huge jump from the 1,750 nits on the S23 Ultra. By comparison, the iPhone 15 Pro Max has a rated peak brightness of 2,000 nits when displaying HDR content.
I took the Galaxy S24 Ultra in direct sunlight and I had no problem making out the action when watching the Mean Girls trailer on YouTube. Samsung also set up a comparison between the S24 Ultra and S23 Ultra under harsh lighting and the newer flagship was noticeably brighter.
The S24 Ultra's panel continues to have a refresh rate of 1-120Hz, which is good, but it would have been nice to see a jump to 144Hz for even smoother gameplay.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: AI features
The Galaxy S24 Ultra ushers in the era of Galaxy AI, and it's more than a marketing gimmick. There's a ton of AI features with this phone, and I had a chance to go hands-on with many of them. Here's some of the most notable AI functions I tried.
Circle to Search: In partnership with Google, Circle to Search on the Galaxy S24 Ultra makes it easy to look up info on any image or video that's on your screen. Just long press the home button, circle the object or subject, and a search results page will pop up.
I tried this feature with yellow flowers and found out it was a Makora plant. Once you're don,e just swipe down and go back to what you were doing, as you never need to leave the app you're in. Note that Circle to Search should work in video apps like TikTok and YouTube as well.
Chat Assist: Built into the keyboard, Chat Assist can help you craft just the right message using the right tone. You can choose from options like Casual, #Social and Professional. I typed something purposely rude to see how the AI would massage my tone. So "Hi I'm running late but you have nothing better to do so I'm assuming it's fine." turned into "Hey, I know I'm running late, but you're probably just chilling, so it's all good."
Live Translate: With Live Translate you can speak to someone else in one of 13 different languages. You'll see this option in the Phone app, and I tried it by making a mock restaurant reservation with someone who speaks Spanish in a demo. The translations seemed accurate and it was fairly easy to converse with the other person, but I could see how the interaction and slight latency might confuse or frustrate the other caller at first.
Notes AI Features: If you use the Notes app on Samsung phones, you'll be glad to know that you can auto format notes using AI, so you'll be able to get quick summaries with bullet points. The AI can also straighten your handwriting if you're using the S Pen.
Samsung Voice Recorder: In addition to transcribing your voice recordings, the Samsung Voice Recorder app can auto summarize them to make it easier to get the context quickly. It can also differentiate several speakers.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: Cameras
There's lots of AI camera features, too, once you start editing pics. But before we get to that how about the cameras themselves? The good news is that the main 200MP has 60% larger pixels, which should let in more light, and the optical image stabilization is also improved for steadier videos.
On the zoom front, you still get a dedicated 10MP 3x telephoto lens but in a controversial move, Samsung swapped the previous 10MP 10x optical zoom for a 50MP 5x zoom. So you get a higher res sensor but less pure zooming power.
I only tested the new 50MP telephoto indoors using Samsung's own props, and it delivered pretty good detail at 10x, but I noticed noise at 30x and beyond. However, I do like that the square guide of your zoomed in view in the upper left corner turns green when it thinks you can get a steady shot.
In terms of AI photo editing features, there's two main ways to tweak your shots. One is by pressing the info button, which will generate suggested fixes for you pic by analyzing the image. For instance, I could easily remove a person's reflection in a window, and the S24 Ultra filled in the background.
Another way to get help is to press the generative AI button in the editing menu. From there, you can circle the subject and easily move them around the frame or make it bigger or smaller, similar to the Google Pixel 8 and Google Pixel 8 Pro. If you decide to change the angle of your photo and need to fill in the background, the S24 Ultra can do that, too.
It can take several seconds for the generative AI feature to work its magic, but it generally performed will in my early testing.
Another nifty AI camera feature is Instant Slow-Mo videos. You don't need to shoot in slow-mo mode; just press and hold on a video in your gallery, and the S24 Ultra will turn that portion of the clip into slow motion footage. This worked well in my testing.
The 12MP front camera doesn't offer any notable upgrades, but it takes advantage of all the same AI features as the other cameras.
Samsung Galaxy S24 hands-on: Performance
The Galaxy S24 Ultra packs Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip, which enables faster CPU and GPU performance along with improved ray tracing for enhanced gameplay visuals. Plus, the NPU on board should speed up AI-related tasks while helping the S24 Ultra last longer on a charger.
This chip is backed up by 12GB of RAM, as well as 256GB of storage to start. The Galaxy S23 Ultra had 8GB of RAM in the entry-level model, so it's nice to see an upgrade here.
For better sustained performance, Samsung is touting an Improved cooling system for the Galaxy S24 Ultra with 92% increased surface area.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: Battery life and charging
The Galaxy S24 Ultra features a 5,000 mAh battery just like the S23 Ultra, so we may not see a big leap in endurance. However, the more efficient Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip could help the S24 Ultra last longer on our web surfing battery test.
The S23 Ultra lasted 12 hours and 22 minutes in adaptive mode for the display and 13:09 in 60Hz mode, which is good enough to make our best phone battery life list. The iPhone 15 Pro Max endured for an even longer 14:02, so Samsung could certainly catch up to Apple. Stay tuned for our test results.
Unfortunately, Samsung didn't add faster charging to the Galaxy S24 Ultra, so you're still stuck with a max wired speed of 45W. The OnePlus 12 80W charging should blow the S24 Ultra away.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on: Software and support
In addition to all of the AI features offered by OneUI 6.1 running on top of Android 14, Samsung is giving a big boost to its software update policy. Samsung is promising 7 years of security updates and 7 years of OS updates. This matches the Google Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra hands-on review: Outlook
The Galaxy S24 Ultra represents a huge bet on AI as a selling point for getting people to upgrade their phones. Sure, there's other notable enhancements, such as the brighter flat display, titanium frame, faster chip and 7 years of updates, but the real star of the show is AI. And based on my initial impressions I do think several of the features are worthwhile and — just as important — easy to use.
I'm particularly impressed by the auto summaries for notes and the quick fixes for images based on suggestions. However, I think users might be confused by some photo editing options being tucked under the info button and others under a generative AI button. Circle to Search in particular could be a game changer, as it works in any app.
Do all of these upgrades add up to a $1,299 phone? That's a lot of money to spend on even the most ultimate of flagships. So stay tuned to our full Galaxy S24 Ultra review to see if it's truly worth the splurge.
