Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra review ft. a pen and good 10x zoom

At first glance, the Galaxy S23 Ultra brings few changes compared to its predecessor. On closer inspection, however, some differences do stand out. The main camera has a higher resolution and Samsung now relies solely on the current best Snapdragon chipset.

Display: still very good

Samsung has kept the predecessor’s design for the Galaxy S23 Ultra. There are five separate camera and sensor bumps in the upper left corner of the smooth, monochrome glass back. A chic design, to be sure, but it’s kind of boring to see the exact same thing again.

On the front is a 6.8-inch, high-contrast AMOLED display with a very high resolution of 3,080 × 1,440 pixels. However, the screen is set to 2316 × 1080 pixels ex-factory to reduce power consumption. Even the lower resolution is enough to take a sharp picture. At 1,200 nits, the display is bright enough to read what’s on it in sunshine.

The refresh rate ranges from 1 to 120 hertz and is set to adaptive by default, meaning it automatically adjusts to the intensity of movement being displayed. It works well and is pleasant to use. The in-display fingerprint sensor also works quickly and reliably. Samsung relies on Gorilla Glass Victus 2, the latest shatter- and scratch-resistant glass from Corning, for the front and back.

Would you like some more power?

Samsung has decided to unify things. Until now, it depended on the country of sale whether the manufacturer’s top smartphones were equipped with an in-house Exynos or top-tier Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. The Galaxy S23 Ultra uses a modified Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 everywhere. Its performance core is clocked at 3.36 gigahertz, which is slightly higher than the standard version of the processor, which offers 3.19 gigahertz. This is less noticeable in benchmark tests such as Geekbench 6 than I’d initially expected.

In single-core mode, where the single performance core is challenged, my test device with twelve gigabytes of working memory outdoes the OnePlus 11 and the Xiaomi 13 Pro. However, the Motorola Edge 40 Pro actually performs just a touch better with a lower clock frequency. In multi-core mode, all four smartphones are on par with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. When it comes to graphics, the Galaxy S23 Ultra is slightly ahead of the OnePlus 11 in OpenCL. Motorola and Xiaomi are way behind.

So what do these numbers mean in terms of everyday use? The Galaxy S23 Ultra packs a real punch. Probably more than you’ll end up actually using. Even games rarely push the smartphone to its limits. Tasks like video rendering are most likely to do so, but even then, the S23 Ultra is one of the fastest phones.

Android 13 with additions from Samsung

Android 13 comes installed by default on the Galaxy S23 Ultra. Samsung peps up the operating system with its One UI 5.1 user interface. In addition to its own look, it includes numerous features that aren’t part of Android’s standard scope. Split-screen view, for instance, makes more sense on the S23 Ultra with the S Pen than on smaller phones. Samsung Dex offers you a desktop view on large screens, while Expert RAW gives you a dedicated camera mode for uncompressed pictures.

Samsung guarantees four Android updates – that is, up to Android 17 – as well as five years of security updates for the Galaxy S23 Ultra.

(Wireless) charging

Samsung has equipped the Galaxy S23 Ultra with a 5,000 mAh battery. That’s good for a top-of-the-line smartphone. I get through the day just fine with my typical usage time of four to six hours.

Charging the battery fully takes a bit more than an hour via cable at up to 45 watts. Important: Samsung no longer includes a power adapter with the smartphone. If you don’t have a suitable one at hand, you’ll have to buy it separately, either from Samsung or other manufacturers. What’s crucial is that it provides at least 45 watts of power.

Wireless charging is also possible, but it takes longer at just up to 15 watts. You can also use the S23 Ultra itself to wirelessly charge other devices. To do so, activate Wireless PowerShare in the settings – and be patient. The S23 Ultra transmits a maximum of 4.5 watts via the Qi standard.

High resolution and zoom

Two of the S23 Ultra’s five cameras make it stand out from the other phones in the Galaxy S23 line-up: the main camera with the 200-megapixel HP2 sensor and the 10-megapixel telephoto camera with a focal length of 230 millimetres, which offers 10x optical zoom. These are complemented by cameras that the Ultra shares with the other two S23 models, namely a 12-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera, 10-megapixel telephoto camera with 3x zoom and 12-megapixel front-facing camera.

However, the Galaxy S23 Ultra’s main camera doesn’t deliver 200-megapixel, but 12-megapixel photos by default. This is completely sufficient for most use cases. Samsung uses the main sensor’s high resolution for so-called pixel binning. That is, adjacent pixels are combined – in this case, it should be 16 of them. Among other things, smartphone and camera module manufacturers claim this improves light sensitivity. In addition, this reduces the file size by about 90 per cent.

Beautiful colours and rich detail

I really like the colour reproduction on the Galaxy S23 Ultra. The colours look vivid without being garish. Even with only 12 megapixels, the level of detail is very high. In addition to being high enough to send around the photos and post them online, you can also print them out in large format.

See more with the ultra-wide-angle camera

The ultra-wide-angle camera delivers the same resolution – 12 megapixels – as the main camera with pixel binning. Its viewing angle is 120 degrees, which corresponds to a focal length of 13 millimetres in 35 mm format.

The software calculates the curvature of the lens, meaning no distortions are visible around the corners. In daylight, the colour reproduction matches the good results of the main camera and the level of detail is only slightly lower.

Good 10x zoom, useless 100x zoom

The Galaxy S23 Ultra is one of the few smartphones with a good zoom camera. Up to 10x zoom, which corresponds to the focal length of the telephoto camera, the image quality surpasses that of any digital zoom hands down. The smaller telephoto lens with 3x zoom – equivalent to a KB focal length of 69 millimetres – also invites you to lock onto a faraway subject.

A small drawback is that the Galaxy S23 Ultra digitally reproduces the intermediate steps, such as 5x zoom. In terms of quality, these are nowhere near the 10x zoom.

The maximum 100x digital zoom, on the other hand, remains a gimmick. It’s simply a digitally enlarged section of an image. I can also read the time off St. Michael’s Church in Hamburg on the photo with 10x zoom. A year ago, Dominik photographed a different subject on the Galaxy S22 Ultra, which makes comparing the two phones difficult. Either way, no improvement is immediately apparent to me.

A comparison with a section from the photo with 10x zoom supports this notion.

Nighttime

In the dark, auto mode is already enough to snap usable pictures that really look like night. Night mode brightens the shot, but not too much. It does, however, give the impression that the brightness slider has been moved up, and I think I can make out slight artefacts in some brightened areas.

With the ultra-wide-angle camera, auto mode remains very dark. In this case, I definitely prefer night mode.

When using the telephoto lens, the verdict is clear: without night mode, the colours are paler and the shot looks a bit more pixelated. Night mode is definitely preferable here.

Selfie cam

With its 12-megapixel sensor, the front-facing camera of the Galaxy S23 Ultra delivers very nice selfies. I’m satisfied with the colour reproduction and detail. If you like taking pictures of yourself, you should be happy with any of the S23 models. They rely on the same front-facing camera and the same software for editing.

The S Pen: a pen and remote control in one

The Galaxy S23 Ultra inherited the S Pen from the Note series. You can use the stylus to write and draw on the smartphone’s touchscreen. In addition, it acts as a remote control. There’s no longer any competition for Samsung in this area. The only other smartphone with a stylus that I know of is the Moto G Stylus, a new version of which is rumoured (link in German) to be coming soon. However, it’s always been a low mid-range phone until now, not to mention Motorola doesn’t distribute it everywhere in Europe.

To get the S Pen out of the S23 Ultra, I have to press it slightly into the case. It then pops out a bit, allowing me to grab it and pull it all the way out. This automatically opens a blank page. I can start taking notes right away – without having to unlock my phone.

While the pen is small, it feels comfortable to hold. For note-taking, I think it’s perfectly adequate. But I wouldn’t want to write longer texts or create detailed drawings with it. However, this is partly due to the S23 Ultra’s display, which is too small for me for those purposes. I’d rather have a tablet for that.

Since I last took a closer look at the S Pen on the Galaxy Note 10+ at the end of 2019, not many new features have been added. That’s not to say that the existing ones aren’t handy. Thanks to Air View, the stylus doesn’t always have to touch the display. I can simply hover it over the screen at a distance of one to two centimetres to perform an action. To use it as a remote control for music playback (including volume control) or the camera (including zoom and changing the mode or camera), it can be even further away from the phone.

Verdict: very good, but excessive for most

The Galaxy S23 Ultra offers too few changes to hail it as a sensation compared to the S22 Ultra. Nevertheless, Samsung has once again delivered an outstanding device. To pick out anything negative, you have to look very closely – or peep at the price.

The display is excellent, the camera delivers very good photos up to 10x zoom and in terms of performance, the S23 Ultra offers the current possible maximum. The S Pen can be very handy and the promised updates are pleasantly long-term.

If I really wanted to complain about something, I could point out that other smartphones charge faster. But the S23 Ultra is already fast enough for me.

The biggest drawback of the S23 Ultra is its high price. The S23 Ultra’s sister models, the S23 and S23+, are considerably cheaper and offer almost all the positive features of the Ultra within smaller dimensions. Its only unique selling points are the S Pen and the additional telephoto camera, which provides a good 10x zoom. Depending on how much you use it, the premium may or may not be worth it.

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Header image: Jan Johannsen