Moved from a ROG Phone 5 to an S24 Ultra.

Most phones nowadays accomplish all that we ask of them, so it's difficult to differentiate based on speed or core functionality.

The Galaxy S24 Ultra does not disappoint - it's got an IP68 rating, a great camera setup, Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy, and an S Pen. For most people, this will make a great daily driver device. But the problem is, most other phones, including its siblings in the Galaxy lineup, will as well.

What a buyer of this device is looking for is unparalleled function with no compromise on form - and that's where the Galaxy S24 Ultra does fall short.

Let's look at hardware first. Despite its large footprint, it doesn't have the largest battery in its class - presumably because of the space taken up by the S Pen's slot. At the same time, the 5000mah battery will comfortably get you through the day. There are phones on the market with IP68 rating, alongside a side USB-C port (for landscape gaming) with a 3.5mm jack - here the Galaxy S24 Ultra just brings the standard singular USB-C port on the bottom. There are no auxilliary displays on the rear of the phone, and again Samsung has persisted with no notification LED on the front side either. Again, it's been in the design language since the S10 era and expected, but it does feel like an incremental refinement rather than a bold step forward in innovation. The speaker set up is again standard, but lacking if you hold your phone in landscape as you'd likely obscure the primary speaker.

In terms of software, Samsung's claim to fame this generation is Galaxy AI. While some might find these features useful, for someone whose phone is primarily a transactional and away-from-home substitute for a computer - it didn't take long for me to completely disable Bixby and image processing (which didn't produce quite natural looking images anyway). The battery care features are appreciated, but more polish would have been expected - for example - why not offer the user an option in the notifications pane to skip the charging limit once, or enable fast charging once - this would be such a quality of life improvement for those wanting to have those options set to preserve battery lifespan, but still allow exceptions (say when travelling) without having to dig through the menus to turn them off/on and remember to do the opposite.

The same thing does with "Do not Disturb" mode - with AI and machine learning surely it would be easy enough to implement either an algorithm or more options to have the mode play nicely with bedtime/sleep mode, with again a notification to temporarily disable it for 30 minutes or for the day.

That said, the software is solid out of the box, and so is Samsung's dedication to support the phone with regular updates. While I would like to see Samsung continue to push the envelope personally, I understand that they're unlikely to do this with the standard S series (kudos to them on the Z series though) - nevertheless, one can keep hoping!

Having used Android phones for the past 13 years, and Samsung phones for the last 6, I was impressed at how snappy and responsive the S24 Ultra felt. The build quality seems very good and matches what I would expect from a premium phone at this price point. The device feels very comfortable to use, and the new AI focussed features have already become second nature – the circle to search function is very useful when watching videos and you suffer from face blindness!

The speaker and sound quality is very striking. As someone who is heavily into music production, goes to lengths to use audiophile grade headphones and listens to music on studio monitors, I was taken aback at how good this phones speakers actually sounded. I was expecting a tinny speaker with no bottom end, but the large aperture for the bottom speaker certainly provided more low end than I was expecting and I found myself impressed at the quality, I would even go as far as to say I enjoyed listening to music through it!

Having not used an S-Pen for anything other than doodling, I found it quite tough to get started with it, though once I found the instructions the gestures felt natural and easy to get to grips with. My handwriting is terrible so I was surprised to find that the software was able to interpret my scrawl with a pretty good degree of accuracy, though I think it’s a little too inaccurate for me to use daily – having to go back and edit misinterpreted words meant I put the pen down and fell back to the keyboard anyway.

I was impressed how responsive the fingerprint sensor was compared to my old S10e’s fingerprint scanner and even seems a step up from my S23e Ultra’s scanner. The one downside I did see was that once I added a screen protector the sensitivity of the scanner was reduced.

The battery life is brilliant compared to other smart phones I own, even surviving two days of fairly heavy use between charges which surpassed my expectations. The camera quality is incredible, I especially enjoyed the macro shots I could take, having this level of fidelity in a handheld device is amazing. One thing I found when poking through the setting is the adaptive battery protection, which is a very interesting feature. I don’t recall seeing this when setting the phone up so calling this out would have been a nice touch.

I'm very happy with my new purchase and I am looking forward to discovering more about the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and all of it's intuitive features.

I bought it on the actual day of the launching (January 17th) during the Samsung Unpacked event, and my preorder arrived on January 25th which was actually 1 week before the official retail day. That part alone is already an amazing experience!

The unboxing experience is superb as Samsung has finally mastered the "suspense" portion of the package unboxing experience. Although we know Samsung is trying to commit for a greener future, it would have been nice if we went back to getting the free accessories we once used to get (I think the last one was the Note 20 Ultra).

The phone itself has a premium build quality aesthetic, and though now opting for a flat display, still has the nice curved body frame which allows for a better grip. The titanium finish on the frame is superb as it is finally fingerprint resistant. The screen has also been improved to 2600 nits of peak brightness. I did notice however that the saturation levels are lower compared to older flagships, but this may just be caused by the antireflective coating of the Corning Gorilla Armor.

Camera-wise, opting for a 3X + 5X combo for the telephoto was another good decision as it improved the usable focal lengths for everyday photography (most especially portraits). The new 5X 50MP sensor still delivers a very competitive quality 10X zoom thanks to the new sensor crop algorithm. Although 100X zoom has less overall detail compared from an S21 Ultra, the usable zoom range has been improved as quality of photos and videos from 0.6x to 20x/30x has increase significantly. Overall, the photo and video capabilities of the S24 Ultra is a testament of how Samsung commits to innovation.

The new AI features are amazing as well, most importantly the new Notes Organizer, Magic Compose, and Circle to Search, as they improve the efficiency of an everyday workflow. Product prints indicate that these features are free until the end of 2025, but we do hope that they would extend this, or at least make most of the AI features built in on device.

Again, kudos to Samsung for a very well made product!

Proud owner of a Titanium Black S24 Ultra (coming from a Note 9/S21 Ultra).

PS. Please bring back the micro SD slot.

Have been using the S24 Ultra for a few weeks now after previously trying the S22 Ultra and S23 Ultra - Samsung have pretty much hit the mark for me this year.

Firstly, the design isn't anything radically different from before but the combination of flat display (much prefer this to curved displays) and the type of glass/coating used means the device is so much better to use. The flat display enhances the use with the S-Pen in my opinion and the lack of reflections on the edges as well as the improved reflection performance across the screen just makes the devices so much easier to use in all lighting conditions.

Much has been talked about online about the 'Vivid' setting of the display not being as bold or punchy as before - what the setting now offers though is a far more natural/accurate looking display which doesn't exhibit so much warmth in dark mode as the previous version did - I much prefer this year's setting.

The introduction of Titanium this year hasn't really impacted the weight of the device overall but the S23 Ultra does feel more balanced weight wise and perhaps not as top heavy as before?

One other thing that stands out is battery life - this took me completely by surprise - 8-10 hours screen on time is now the norm, compared to the usual 6 or so on most recent Android flagships that I achieve - impressive when the phone is constantly connected to a Galaxy Watch 6 and is frequently being woken my me wanting to have another look at the fantastic display!

Other than that is business pretty much as usual for Samsung. The camera is good, but will likely become great after a few software upgrades, the AI functions work very well and the overall feeling is of a daily workhorse device that really doesn't have any major negatives. The only thing I wish Samsung could incorporate next time would just be a way to soften the corners of the device - these are a bit on the harsh side and likely to shred through pocket linings at a rapid pace!

All in all though - the S23 Ultra comes highly, highly recommended. Great work Samsung.