Review of the Galaxy S23 Ultra: An Ultra Compact, High-Performance Cellular Phone for End-to-End Consumers
We got our hands on the more affordable, but still good looking, $800 and $1,000Galaxy S23 and S23+, which both have the same key features as their more expensive brethren, but without the advanced cameras, and with the same fast processors. If you’re a power user with a need for a large, pen-friendly display and powerful cameras, the S23 Ultra could be an alternative to the best phones on the market. We will be putting the entire S23 line through its paces to see how it compares to last year’s models and the recent competition from Apple andGoogle.
If you buy through Verizon, you can get up to $800 off the S23 Ultra with an eligible trade-in on a 5G Unlimited plan — on top of a free Galaxy Watch 5 and Galaxy Tab S7 FE. You can get a free upgrade to your storage if you pre-order via Verizon, as well as get a free $200 eCard if you switch carriers.
The slight flattening makes the S23 Ultra look a little more boxier than the S22 Ultra. I like it. It is kind of late- ’80s chic in the cream color. I don’t know what else to call it. It feels worthy of a high price tag.
What Samsung Announced at the First In-Person Unpacked Galaxy Unpacked Event: Make Your Own Galaxy S23 and Other Laptops (and More)
The camera experience is just as good. Portrait mode photos look amazing, the expert photo app from Samsung gives you a high amount of control over how your images look, night mode helps in particularly dark situations, and the ultrawide camera remains wide enough to capture full landscapes without missing out.
The pomp around smartphone launches is often deflated by one word: iterative. Too often, a shiny, just-released phone fails to add anything exciting to the list of features we saw in the previous models. If there is a crazy new trick, it’s gimmicky; if there isn’t, well, there’s probably no need to upgrade, right?
The Galaxy S23 series isn’t the lone hardware announcement from the company. At its big media event today in San Francisco—the first in-person Galaxy Unpacked since the pandemic—Samsung also unveiled a whopping five new laptops, all of which are badged with the new Galaxy Book3 name. Here’s everything Samsung announced at the show.
To make the screen tougher to scratch or crack, Samsung is employing Corning’s Gorilla Glass Victus 2, a material that is purportedly more durable than Corning’s previous formulas and contains more post-consumer recycled material. And while Apple has long used stainless steel for its iPhone Pro models, a choice which improves those phones’ durability and scratch resistance, Samsung’s phones are weirdly all still made from aluminum. The company says it has doubled the number of recycled parts in the S23 Ultra to twelve from the speaker module to the volume keys.
The Galaxy S23/iPhone 14 and iPhone 14: Comparisons and Challenges of a Globally Optimized Cellular Phone
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These phones are powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy chip with 8 GB of RAM—not just in the US, but globally. There are an additional refinements to the chips that make them more efficient, which is what the term for the chips is indicating. The phone’s cooling chamber is two times larger and will keep it cooler when playing extended sessions. All of the models share the same 12-megapixel ultrawide, a similar 3X optical zoom and a new 12-megapixel selfie cam.
You might want to check out how the new ones compare to Apple’s recent and greatest handsets before committing $799 to a Pre-order. While both lineups include phones with impressive specs, there are a couple of key differences to be aware of.
This is just an example of the main differences between the two phones. If you want to see all of the raw specs in more detail, we can bring you the chart below.
Design-wise, the iPhone 14 lineup notably lacks the Galaxy S23’s physical SIM card tray. That’s because Apple’s new phones rely on eSIM technology, which may make it easier to switch between devices and plans. In practice, however, we found it’s complicated if you’re switching between Android and iOS, and while most major US cell phone networks support eSIM, not all do.
The increase in the selfie cam’s resolution from 10 to 12 mps was one of my favorite things to capture on the phone. The camera’s zoomed-out group selfie mode made it easy to squeeze a friend into my shot without sacrificing any detail, while portrait mode took some excellent headshots with that nice bokeh effect. I liked how much I could change the portrait shots I took with various filters, blur levels and studio lighting to make it appear as though I was in a dark bedroom. I did not see a big jump in selfies quality, but fine details did come through, such as my beard.
What is the Best Camera for a Mobile Phone? The Case for an Ultra-Long-Range Lens, the S23 Ultra, according to TechCrunch
That said, the two share many of the same features, like the ability to edit and undo sent messages and a Live Text feature that can grab text from videos and photos. Some of the other differences are minor. Despite its plethora of customization options, for instance, Android phones lack the ability to add widgets to the lock screen. They also don’t come with Apple’s new drag-and-drop Visual Look Up tool, which lets you pull something from a photo and drag it into another app as a standalone object.
You could be wondering, what do I need a camera for? It seems like pure overkill and a marketing tactic on the surface, and to some extent, it is. The sensor uses a technology called pixel binning which groups a ton of the megapixels together to create larger pixels and produce smaller images. These smaller images, 12MP in size by default, can lean on the extra resolution from the sensor for more detail and light. It’s the same technique other phones like the iPhone 14 Pro and Pixel 7 use with their larger-than-average cameras.
Video quality is also great. Tech reviewers widely consider the iPhone to be the best for taking videos, myself included. But with the S23 Ultra, you can get shots that go toe to toe with clips captured on the latest Apple smartphones, including some that best it. I was surprised to see that the quality of the clips was nearly equally good, as I recorded them during a recent trip to New York. I think the S23 Ultra is a better camera than the iPhone, and it is a close race.
You have the ability to capture large 200MP photos. There is a button in the camera app which you can turn on, and it is enjoyable to play with. It will eat away at your storage faster than normal photos and you can use it only if you want to print a picture after it’s been taken.
Of course, the buck goes beyond the main camera. Samsung packs in three additional lenses: a 12MP 120-degree ultra-wide, a 10MP telephoto with 3x optical zoom, and a 10MP periscoping telephoto lens with 10x optical zoom. The S22 Ultra has one major improvement over these cameras: optical image stabilization, so good that you would think your phone was on a tripod when taking zoom shots.
Overall, this is one of the best camera experiences you can have on a smartphone. The Apple phone has a lot of features that are very similar to the one in the Pixel 7 Pro and the iPhone 14 Pro. This $1,299 phone is worthy of itsUltra name because of how good it is.
The back of the phone has cameras that sit on it. It looks premium because of the frosted glass finish for the backplate and shiny aluminum rails on the sides. The sides are now a lot flatter than they used to be, which gives the device a very similar feel to previous devices.
The curve on the left and right sides was reduced so that the content didn’t spill over as easily. It is especially helpful when drawing with the S Pen. It is a lot cooler to look at because of the light reflecting off the curves in the glass.
OnePlus 11 Versus S23 Ultra: All-Day Battery Recharging and Software Promptness from Geek Benchmark to One UI 5.1
The extra power is evident in the chart below, where we compare the OnePlus 11’s Geekbench scores to those on the S23 Ultra. The Most powerful chip in the current generation of phones is Apple’s A16 Bionic, but that chip is not as powerful as the 8 Gen 2 ForGalaxy.
All that is to say you can get through a day of moderate use with the S23 Ultra a little more comfortably, and it stands up a bit better to heavier use. If you plan on doing a lot of processor-heavy stuff like gaming or, I don’t know, measuring every room in your house in VR, then you’ll probably still need to recharge before the day is done. For most of us, this is an all-day battery, with a little more wiggle room than last year’s.
I fired up Asphalt 9 like I do with most phones I test, and it ran perfectly well. I didn’t experience any dropped frames or slowdowns, and the phone stayed nice and cool the entire time.
Speaking of software, One UI 5.1 — based on Android 13 — is what you’ll get out of the box with the S23 Ultra. By far, this is the best version of Samsung’s skin I’ve come across. It’s nearly identical to One UI 5.0 in terms of functionality and looks (besides a few customization options for your lock screen and some changes in system apps), but it’s a lot more responsive and efficient this time around.
I had a feel for how it was when I used the Z Fold 4 for a while. In short, I really liked it, but it definitely felt a tad slower than Google’s Pixel software or Apple’s iOS. One UI 5.1 flips that on its head, as the S23 Ultra feels just as fluid and snappy. Is it the new processor? What about the storage’s speed? Good old-fashioned software improvement? I’m going with the latter, because everything from launching apps to scrolling Twitter feels more responsive than any Samsung phone I’ve reviewed in the past.
I haven’t been a huge stylus fan in the past, and I still think that most people will rarely use one given the option. But I was more inclined to pop out the S Pen and jot down a note with the S23 Ultra than when I tested the S22 Ultra. At the risk of giving Samsung’s very slight redesign too much credit, I think this is partially because this phone is more comfortable to hold than the last one.
My typical day includes about four hours of screen-on time, and the S23 Ultra usually got me to the evening with somewhere around 30 percent left. Extra drain on the battery can be put on by using the always-on display. I tried putting it through the wringer a day with more intensive activities and lots of camera use, all off of wi-fi. The battery fell to 25 percent by the end of the day. I probably should have gone a bit harder on the phone, as I came down with food poisoning and was unable to use the phone or do anything.
The definition of a brick: The Galaxy S23 Ultra. Is it really a good phone? It’s heavy, and very ugly, but worth the money
The device is capable of charging in just 30 minutes, and it has 45 watt fast wired charging, which makes it very easy to charge from zero to 50 percent. You get 15W wireless charging and 4.5W reverse wireless charging, which help you to charge your earbuds on the go. Everything you need to juice up was in the package.
It is also heavy. At 234 grams, it’s six grams lighter than the iPhone 14 Pro Max but also 22 grams heavier than the Pixel 7 Pro. The definition of a brick is this phone.
You don’t need a problem until you realize there are many apps on the S23 Ultra. I didn’t include other pre-installed apps like Microsoft andNetflix on my unit. It eats up a fair amount of storage space, collectively reducing your phone’s overall capacity by about 20-30 gigabytes. For those that don’t use Samsung’s stock apps and prefer alternatives like Google’s, it’ll feel like a waste of space.
You wouldn’t think that the advertisements in its own applications look as crummy as they do. The amount of ads it shows has luckily decreased over previous Galaxy phones, but they’re still around. Samsung Pay and Galaxy Store like to advertise promotions from third parties, while the Samsung Members app regularly reminds me to preorder a Galaxy S23 Ultra… while I’m holding one.
$1,200 is a lot of money for a new phone, especially these days. If you don’t need features such as the 200MP camera or S Pen, the regular Galaxy S23 can be had for less and still have great performance and battery life. The most amazing price for the Pixel7 Pro is only $599 and it is usually on sale for more than that.
That is good news. The good news is that it is still expensive at $1,200, which is a bit more expensive than the cost of the Apple iPhone 14 Pro and the cost of the Nintendo Wii U. There are some sore places with the software, like its insistence on including its own app store. And although the camera system can produce stunningly good images, it occasionally makes weird choices and comes up with a photo that’s just downright bad.
All that said, it is still a very big and relatively heavy phone. The screen is still a 6.8-inch 1440p LTPO OLED panel with a top 120Hz refresh rate. It is lovely to use and the same as last year. The embedded fingerprints sensor is slower and inconsistent than the one used on the OnePlus 11 5G, and that’s my only complaint. Thankfully, face unlock is pretty speedy. With both biometric security methods enabled, I found that one or the other worked quickly enough.
There are so many other perks of a high end phone, like a robust immunity for water and dust resistance, along with wireless charging, fast 45W wired charging, and built-in storage capacities of at least 512K, that you can’t help but conclude that it’s worth
The phone was only slightly warm to the touch after 10 minutes of installing the Gen Shin Impact install files, as the loading animation played and the phone rested on a heat-insulating couch cushion. After doing something like that, the S22 Ultra was very uncomfortable to hold. It’s very smooth and there is a small hiccup as it loads more data.
The latter worked perfectly on my 2016-era TV. The TV connects to the S23 Ultra via SmartThings despite being an older model. From the SmartThings app on the phone, I have control of all the basic functions of the TV, like volume, channel, and source. At long last, I thought I’d conquered my need to get off the couch and find the remote. The TV I have is old and lacks support for a feature that works on mobile. Looks like I’ll still need that remote after all.
S23 Ultra: Getting More Out of My Writing Challenge and Making More Room for My E-Memo: Why I’m Glad I Did. How I Managed to Reorganize My Life
That happens less often with the S23 Ultra, but I still found at least one instance where the slight curve threw me for a loop. One of the templates in the notes app includes a left-aligned column of boxes to write in, but when I started writing in letters to mark days of the week, I had very little space to work with since the stylus kept running into the curve. I would like to have a flat display in 2024.
I’m also on a mission to reorganize my life, and I found it genuinely useful to replicate some of my running IRL to-do lists with digital ones pinned to my home screen. Is it making me more organized? The jury’s still out on that one. It feels like a happy medium because it allows for an app-based list of things to be done while still allowing for a sense of immediacy with a note.
But the more interesting way that it works is by combining those pixels into groups and treating them as bigger individual pixels (a process called pixel binning) to improve image quality in less-than-great lighting conditions. The sensor uses a re-mosaic system to mimic a traditional colored filter pattern and use pixels individually to capture more detail in bright light. Even if you are in the default shooting mode, you should see the benefits of extra detail capture.
I use it on my social networks and it does a good job, coming up with 30x images and making me very happy. Would my Space Needle photo look great as an 8×10” print on my wall? Not likely. It is well beyond the threshold for social media. Digital zoom has come a long way.
Source: https://www.theverge.com/23598871/samsung-galaxy-s23-ultra-review-camera-battery-screen-s-pen
Low-light Portraits of a Very Active Toddler: Galaxy S23 Ultra-Review Camera Battery Screen Pencil Review (SUMMER 2016)
Low-light photos are generally fine, though I saw a couple of weird things happen in particularly challenging situations. My toddler looked orange and pale in the first portrait photo, which was taken in a Mexican restaurant, and he was pale in the next one. Whatever the reason, the colored walls and light sources may have taken the photo off the rails.
A couple of my low-light portraits have a bit of an unnatural HDR look about them, with over-brightened shadows. Forcing night mode on in dim conditions is bad for the image of the device, so it’s best to let the phone decide when it’s dark enough.
The portrait mode is one of the best in the game. It’s hands down the winner when it comes to subject isolation and manages to hang on to incredibly fine details like individual hairs. The classic cardboard cutout look is still possible because of the background blur, especially on the 1x setting. It doesn’t look as noticeable in 3x zoom portraits.
The video quality is great, you can record it at up to 8k/30p, but I chose 4k for most of the time. Clips in good lighting show nice color and detail. Indoors, I saw a tendency to flatten dynamic range in a way that turns bright whites slightly gray. Bright colors look a little oversaturated, too. But it’s more than good enough to grab clips of a very active toddler, and I didn’t hear any complaints about video quality from his grandparents.
Source: https://www.theverge.com/23598871/samsung-galaxy-s23-ultra-review-camera-battery-screen-s-pen
Comparison Between $1,200 and $800 Galaxy S23+ and Its Bright, Colorful and Ultra-Smooth AMOLED Screen
It’s also not the most approachable device. All of those cameras, the deep menus, and, most of all, the steep price tag will put off a lot of people. It can take a little fiddling to remove the software from the device. You probably shouldn’t have to spend the time doing that on a $1,200 phone.
Every smart device now requires you to agree to a series of terms and conditions before you can use it — contracts that no one actually reads. It’s impossible for us to read and analyze every single one of these agreements. Since most people can’t negotiate, we started counting how many times you have to agree to use devices when we review them.
I’m at a crossroads. Just a few weeks ago, I reviewed Samsung’s Galaxy A14 5G, calling it a phenomenal phone that costs a mere $200, proving that you really don’t need to pay heaving wads of dough to get a great smartphone. I’m looking at the $1,200 and $800 versions of the S23 so I’m not sure what to think.
The new phones don’t give you any reason to upgrade from a flagship device. But if you have something older in your pocket, or a more wallet-friendly device that you feel offers a compromised experience, then you should definitely take a look.
The standard 6.1-inch version of theGalaxy S23 was the perfect size for my hands. The 6.6-inch S23+ was still pleasantly lightweight, but its larger design often made using it a two-handed affair. If you don’t want your phone to fall out of your hands, you’d better grab a case because these phones have glossy edges that don’t feel slippery to me. That said, if I were to pick my next phone by looks alone, the Galaxy S23 would be at the top of my list.
At this time, it feels redundant to say that a bright, colorful and ultra-smooth display is a major highlight of the galaxy device, since it is the most important part of the device. I spent most of my time with the S23+ and its beautiful 6.6-inch AMOLED screen, which popped with color whether I was flipping through my app library or taking in the cosmic blues and reds of the “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” trailer. I can flip through websites with ease, thanks to the fact that the 120Hz display from Samsung gives me the most fluid display I have tested.
Super-Bright Battery Lifetime in the Galaxy S23+: Getting Better Performance with a Portable Charger at Home Using Smart Modes and Focus
For example, I set up a work mode that only allowed select notifications from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., as well as a sleep mode that kept my phone completely silent at night. You can even link specific wallpapers to specific modes, such as the less-distracting blue background I use during the day and the photo of my dog I have active during off-hours. Modes and routines can be turned on or off based on the activities you are doing, like running, or even a specific location. It’s all very simple to set up, and it’s similar to how Apple’s Focus profiles work oniOS 16.
The Galaxy S23 can shoot video at up to 8K at 30 frames per second, or up to 4K at 60 fps. I mostly stuck to the latter, and everything from the rippling waves of a river to the arrival of a speeding train looked gloriously smooth — when I was under decent lighting, at least. The clips I captured of the aforementioned concert were a bit less fluid due to the lack of light, but were still crisp and watchable enough to land on my Instagram story.
You can confidently leave that portable charger at home — the Galaxy S23+ is one of the longest-lasting phones I’ve ever tested. Samsung’s phone lasted an incredible 20 hours and 47 minutes on our battery test, which consists of continuous 4K video playback. That’s a significant improvement over the 13 to 14 hours we got from last year’s S22+ and S22 Ultra models and crushes the 15 hours we got from the Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro. It took 21 hours and 36 minutes to finish, which was second only to the OnePlus 11.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/cnn-underscored/reviews/samsung-galaxy-s23-s23-plus?iid=CNNUnderscoredHPcontainer
OneUI vs. OneUI: How Much Do We Really Need to Know About the OS? An Observation from the Nokia Lab
The OneUI interface of the phone that I own is smooth, but I find it too busy and cluttered to be the same experience as the one on the other device. If you need to get work done on the go or have deep ties to theSamsung/Microsoft ecosystems, the phone could be useful because of the plethora of apps it comes with. These apps may seem confusing and unnecessary for everyone else. Do we really need a store on top of the Play Store?