The headline of Samsung Galaxy 24 series is undoubtedly the AI revolution that the Korean telecoms giant has pushed. In our five-star review of Samsung Galaxy S24+, we lauded the near-flawless display of the power of AI at large, as well as the brand’s take on the nascent tech. Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra carries the same AI power and functionality, with a few extras centred around the S-Pen stylus, in a bigger, bolder package.
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A sleek, powerful phablet that represents excellent value, even at a premium-plus price, Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is a productivity shortcut. A device aimed at professionals and creatives, S24 Ultra offers a raft of features for work, but also conquers 3D gaming and snaps striking social media images.
Ultra Visual Design
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra wears a macro design iterates on the 2023 model. The boxy design offers straight edges and neat lines along the top, bottom, front and back. Like S23 Ultra, Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra has rounded edges along the sides.
The brushed titanium frame meets the huge display and the frosted glass rear with a pleasing tight interface. The machining and attention to detail on how the materials meet are incredible to behold.
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Our Titanium Grey review model Galaxy S24 Ultra is muted, but far from boring. The rear frosted glass matches the surrounding metal body, with the aforementioned tight machining framing the backpiece beautifully.
That sleek rear is punctuated only by four lenses, a fifth lens-like sensor, the dual flash, and a Samsung logo subtly etched in gloss. Like Samsung Galaxy S24+, Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is a minimalist visual masterpiece that leverages premium materials and the company’s fabrication prowess to form an irresistibly elegant aesthetic.
Super-Premium Feel
Galaxy S24 Ultra is an impeccably built device. The tight tolerances, reassuringly dense form, and premium materials feel great in the hand. The continued use of slim bezels around the display and the rounded side edges make the 6.8″ display surprisingly usable in one hand.
The lightly frosted rear glass and titanium frame also aid holding the device. For a screen so large, Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is comfortable and far from unwieldy, even in smaller adult hands.
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Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus boasts a slim profile at under 8mm thick. Its design, featuring a brushed aluminium frame and a subtly frosted back, ensures ease of handling and one-handed use. The slender frame paired with a weight of 197 grams provides a solid and substantial feel.
Ultra Powerful
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra boasts its own Exynos 2400 chipset in Europe and in its home markets. The chipset is a beast, and will effortlessly handle any non-AI task or application you might use.
Samsung S24 Ultra also showcases incredibly smooth UI and menu transitions, along with other visual effects, as part of the One UI 6.1, which is based on Android 14, maintaining flawless performance throughout.
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Samsung has also introduced their AI platform, and the chipset is responsible for a great deal of the advanced processing on the device.
Handling the most intensive AAA 3D games is a breeze for the device. Galaxy S24 Ultra also allows you to prioritise gaming, allocating all necessary resources and bandwidth to ensure fluid and uninterrupted gameplay.
AMOLED Next-Gen
The display of Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is suitably all-powerful. The Dynamic LTPO AMOLED 2X can display up to all the way from 1 to 120Hz. The maximum brightness of 2,600nits gives the dynamic range a lot of room.
The display features an anti-glare coating that, when combined with the searing brightness, makes Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra more than usable, even in direct sunlight.
The 1440p resolution fills the 6.8″ display with enough pixels to give S24 Ultra a premium sharpness. The device’s colour engine gives the display a vibrant and lush look. There are also some AI tricks that can enhance older images and videos to improve colour and make them worthy of display on your Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra.
Supreme Quad-Lens Imaging
S24 Ultra is packed with four lenses. The leading lenses are a whopping 200 megapixel wide and a 110 megapixel telephoto duo that capture incredible detail with a wide dynamic range. The colour constancy is excellent between the two, and you won’t ever really notice the device leaning on one lens then switching to the other.
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Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra also sports a 5x optical lens at 50MP that offers a strong imaging performance, but not quite the excellent results seen on the main two lenses. The device can also use the 110MP 3x zoom lens and the 50MP 5x optical zoom lens along with some clever AI imaging to get a highly detailed capture out to 10x hybrid zoom and beyond.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra AI Editing
Samsung Galaxy AI includes an Edit Suggestion tool that recommends appropriate adjustments for each photo. By activating the Generative Edit feature in the settings, you can seamlessly edit parts of an image’s background. The AI will autonomously fill in the edges of skewed shots, suggest alterations in tone or white balance, and centre shots on the intended subject.
Additionally, Samsung’s AI can ‘Remaster’ any image in the Gallery, enhancing clarity and restoring details in lower-resolution images. More advanced features even allow you to reposition objects or subjects within the image.
The AI can also seamlessly blend backgrounds and excise objects with remarkable precision. Samsung’s AI can even automatically eliminate shadows and reflections from any image in the Gallery.
Additionally, Samsung Galaxy Ultra AI shows its prowess with video. A standout feature, Instant Slow-mo, creates extra video frames to decelerate dynamic scenes. While it performs optimally with well-lit, close-up subjects, it can produce captivating slow-motion clips from most videos.
And, whenever a Galaxy S24 series device uses generative AI to modify an image, it embeds a watermark on the image and its metadata. This signals to viewers that the image has been digitally altered.
Real-Time AI Translate
Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus offers two real-time translation services: Live Translate for phone use and Interpreter for in-person interactions. Prior to usage, users must download the necessary language pack for any of the 13 languages they wish to translate.
After downloading the relevant 400MB language pack, both services utilise on-device AI for translation, offering enhanced security and privacy compared to cloud-based translation.
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This also means that full translation services are available without the need for WiFi or mobile data. Samsung S24 Ultra does an impressive amount of its AI processing on the device itself. This sidesteps concerns seen with Google’s rollout of their AI, and demonstrates the impressive NLP capabilities of the S24 series.
It’s worth noting, however, that the AI defaults to using cloud processing, and users must manually set it to ‘device only’ in the AI Assistant menu in the phone’s settings.
Samsung AI also offers two-way, real-time voice translation for phone calls through Live Translate, accessible via the Call Assist menu. This feature performs admirably, keeping pace with the conversation even on suboptimal connections.
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Within the Call Assist menu, you can select from various voices, which include Live Translate services. Note that you must activate Live Translate in your phone’s settings to use this feature.
Live Text Translate
Live Translate can also provide text translations for messages, which are nearly perfect for brief exchanges or straightforward ideas.
For longer sentences with complex thoughts or concepts, it may take a little more work. However, given some context and patience, translated conversations will consistently convey the message. That’s quite impressive for an Samsung AI’s debut.
Samsung AI Interpreter offers a split-screen view for translating speech. This enabling individuals other to read the text transcription of the spoken words. One of the translation windows can be turned upside so you can face each other during the AI translation, which is a neat little touch.
There’s also an AI voice feature that can voice the translation. However, reading the translation is often faster than listening to it.
Samsung AI supports 13 languages, expanding to 18 with global variants. It includes Mexican, American, and traditional Spanish. Nonetheless, there are occasional glitches. For instance, Samsung AI fails to recognize ‘Vinny,’ instead transcribing it as ‘Julie,’ ‘Baby,’ or ‘Deansy’ in Live Translate and Interpreter modes. Similarly, it can sometimes struggle with Irish names, people, and places.
Keyboard Assistant
Chat Assist, integrated with the Samsung Keyboard, works across various apps to refine conversational tones and compile notes within different dialogues. The Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus excels in ensuring messages convey the intended tone, while also enhancing punctuation and spelling.
The generated notes are coherent, capturing the most crucial details in their summaries. Although the language may be concise and context-specific, it consistently highlights the essential points.
The translation AI of the Samsung Keyboard can translate messages, emails, and more in real-time across 13 languages. Its performance is comparable to that of the Interpreter and Live Translate features. While translations of simpler messages are nearly perfect, more complex and lengthy sentences may result in less smooth translations.
AI Secretary
A subtle yet impactful feature in the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is the Text Call. It allows an AI voice, selected by you, to answer calls and notify the caller that they will be communicating through a Text-to-Speech converter. The caller’s words are transformed into text for you to read, and your text responses are then spoken to the caller by the AI voice.
Samsung Notes has also introduced Notes Assist, a robust feature for creating AI-generated summaries. The standalone notes may be concise and context-specific, similar to the Samsung Keyboard feature, but you also have the option to incorporate templates that standardise the style and essential content. Your notes can be accessed in text form or read aloud to you.
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Summaries can be generated from various text formats and from webpages using the Samsung Internet app.
It’s worth noting that advanced features such as in-depth summaries and note collection require cloud processing of data. This could pose a challenge for professionals in areas with poor reception or those with limited roaming data.
Circle to Search as Standard
Another AI feature that requires data is Google’s ‘Circle to Search’. Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is indeed the first phone to incorporate this gesture-driven search function.
By pressing and holding the home button, you can circle, highlight, scribble on, or tap anything on Galaxy S24’s screen to learn more or purchase what you’re targeting. Similar to other AI features, it performs exceptionally well with familiar objects or logos, but may struggle with less-known landmarks or items that are more region-specific than global.
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Circle to Search sometimes struggles to identify objects on external screens, such as TVs or monitors. However, it performs much better when recognising objects on your phone’s display, with object recognition and suggested actions usually being accurate.
On the whole, Circle to Search is effectively integrated into the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. When it functions correctly, which is most of the time, it stands out as a feat of object recognition and a novelty that is sure to impress your friends. Its usefulness will depend on the individual, but it’s particularly handy on leisure trips, or when window shopping.
S24 Ultra Stamina and Charging
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra features a 5,000mAh battery, which, when coupled with intelligent power management, provides the device with ample endurance to match its processing power. For moderate users, reaching bed-time on day two is not an unrealistic prospect.
Galaxy S24 Ultra is capable of handling a full workday for power users, as it easily tackling even the most intensive tasks. It’s worth noting that Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra also handles streaming video and high-bitrate audio more efficiently than many other smartphones. This allows for hours of use without significant battery drain – a particularly appreciated feature during long trips or busy days.
S24 Ultra supports fast charging up to 45W via USB-C, using the PD3.0 standard. The PD standard enables chargers from different brands that comply with the specification to charge any compatible device at higher speeds.
We’ve had a few devices over our desk that have PD2.0 or PD3.0 compatibility, and it’s a quality of life bump to no longer have to find a particular charger just to speedily juice up. And, with many makers now omitting a charger this cross compatibility will only become even handier.
45W wired is not a huge figure, but at around one hour to charge from 0-100% it’s still a convenient recharging process. The advertised 0-65% in 30 minutes is perfect for a last-moment charge, especially given the stamina of Galaxy S24 Ultra.
Ultra by Nature
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is a master of all trades. A blazing fast processor, unmatched video and audio capabilities, a best-in-class display, and the best AI assistant implementation to date, mean Ultra is more than just a name.
Galaxy S24 Ultra also combines amazing optics with AI to capture some stunning images. The S-Pen stylus functionality is elevated by the new AI assistant tricks, while the whole package is wrapped in elegance and premium materials.
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra Specifications
| Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra | |
| Chipset: | Samsung Exynos 2400 (reviewed) OR Qualcomm SM8650-AC Snapdragon 8 CPU – 10-core: 1×3.2GHz Cortex-X4, 2×2.9GHz Cortex-A720, 3×2.6GHz Cortex-A720, 4×1.95GHz Cortex-A520 (reviewed) OR – 8-core: 1×3.39GHz Cortex-X4, 3×3.1GHz Cortex-A720, 2×2.9GHz Cortex-A720, 2×2.2GHz Cortex-A520 GPU – Xclipse 940 (reviewed) OR – Adreno 750 |
| RAM: | 12GB |
| Storage: | 256GB (reviewed), 512GB, 1TB |
| Display: | 6.7″, 1,440 x 3,120 pixels, 19.5:9 ratio AMOLED 2X, 120Hz, HDR10+ |
| Camera: | – 200 MP, f/1.7, 24mm (wide), multi-directional PDAF, Laser AF, OIS – 110 MP, f/2.4, 67mm (telephoto), PDAF, OIS, 3x optical zoom – 50 MP, f/3.4, 111mm (periscope telephoto), PDAF, OIS, 5x optical zoom – 12 MP, f/2.2, 13mm, 120˚ (ultrawide), dual pixel PDAF, Super Steady video Video: 8K@24/30fps, 4K@30/60/120fps, 1080p@30/60/240fps, HDR10+, Super Steady video, gyro-EIS |
| Selfie Cam: | Photo: 12 MP, f/2.2, 26mm (wide), Dual Pixel PDAF Video: 4K@30/60fps, 1080p@30fps, HDR10+, Dual Video |
| OS: | Android 14, One UI 6.1 |
| Battery: | Li-Ion 5000 mAh |
| Charging: | – 45W wired, PD3.0, 0-65% in c. 30 mins. – 15W wireless |
| Connectivity: | – Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/6e/7, Wi-Fi Direct – Bluetooth 5.3, A2DP, LE – GPS, GLONASS, BDS, GALILEO, QZSS |
| Dimensions: | 162.3 x 79 x 8.6 mm |
| Weight: | 233 g |
| Colours: | Titanium Black, Titanium Grey, Titanium Violet, Titanium Yellow, Titanium Blue, Titanium Green, Titanium Orange |
Galaxy S24 Ultra Pricing and Availability
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is available SIM-free in Ireland from €1,469. And Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is available in the US from US from $1,299 sim-free and in the UK from £1,349 sim-free.
Samsung Galaxy S24+ review unit provided by Samsung Ireland
