Newsletter
Samsung has just announced the Galaxy S24 earlier than ever before. At Unpacked in San Jose, Samsung has unveiled the three new Galaxy S24 models, which all seem to have some pretty big upgrades this year. Of course, the upgrade that Samsung is going to talk about the most is Galaxy AI.
With Galaxy AI, Samsung is adding a slew of AI features to the Galaxy S24, which are not gimmicks either. We got a chance to check out these features in a few demos last week, which you can read about in our hands-on. Some of these include Chat Assist, Transcribe Assist, and Live Translate. These are all built into the Samsung Keyboard, allowing you to quickly write a message and have AI write a better message, translate it into a different language, or do live translation with someone else.
Samsung has also added some AI features to the camera for editing. Galaxy AI will recommend some changes that you can make to your photos. It will also use Generative AI to remove objects, move people around in the photo, and more. The good news here is that any photo that is edited with Galaxy AI will have a little watermark in the corner, showing you it was done with AI.
Buy At Samsung - Galaxy S24/Galaxy S24+
Buy At Samsung - Galaxy S24 Ultra
Galaxy S24 and S24 Plus get larger screens in the same body size
Leading up to today’s announcement, one thing we saw quite a bit in the leaks was that the bezels on all three models would shrink incredibly. On the Galaxy S24 and Galaxy S24 Plus, this resulted in a larger screen, but the overall physical size remains the same. So that’s 6.2-inch and 6.7-inch displays. The Galaxy S24 Plus also gets an upgrade to QHD+ resolution, while the regular Galaxy S24 sticks with FHD+. Both are Adaptive 120Hz refresh rate displays, too.
The Galaxy S24 Ultra sticks with the same 6.8-inch display, which is QHD+ with an adaptive 120Hz refresh rate.
Other internals include the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 across the board for the US, but Exynos 2400 for the Galaxy S24 and Galaxy S24 Plus in other countries. Galaxy S24 Ultra will get Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 worldwide, however. Samsung says that this move was due to the supply chain, and the experience should be the same on Exynos and Snapdragon, especially when it comes to the AI features.
The Galaxy S24 Plus will get 8GB of RAM and either 128GB or 256GB of storage, with a 4,000mAh capacity battery. While the Galaxy S24 Plus will get 12GB of RAM and either 256GB or 512GB of storage, with a pretty large 4,900mAh capacity battery. Both phones also sport a 50-megapixel main camera, a 10-megapixel 3x telephoto camera, a 12-megapixel ultrawide camera, and a 12-megapixel front-facing camera.
With the Galaxy S24 Ultra, you’re getting 12GB of RAM with the choice of 256GB, 512GB, or 1TB of storage. It also has the same 5,000mAh capacity battery that we’ve seen for the past few years on the Galaxy S Ultra phones.
Both the Galaxy S24 Ultra and S24 Plus get 45W charging, though the charger is not included in the box. Samsung says you can go from 0-65% in about 30 minutes. On the regular Galaxy S24, you’re getting 25W, which will get you 0-50% in about 30 minutes. Finally, all three models launch with Android 14 and One UI 6.1. As well as having IP68 for water and dust resistance.
Titanium is in
As much as some people are going to claim that Samsung copied Apple by adding Titanium to the Ultra model this year, that’s likely not very true. It’s important to keep in mind that these phones were being developed well over a year ago. Before, Apple did Titanium, so it’s more likely a happy coincidence. But I will say the titanium looks great on the Galaxy S24 Ultra.
I got a chance to play around with the Galaxy S24 Ultra before Unpacked, and it’s really incredible how light the Galaxy S24 Ultra is compared to the Galaxy S23 Ultra. Of course, Samsung never used stainless steel – they used Armor Aluminum instead – so the weight difference isn’t as big as the iPhone 14 Pro Max to iPhone 15 Pro Max. It is actually only a single gram lighter this year, which is crazy to think about, considering the weight difference in the hand.
Galaxy S24 Ultra finally gets 5x optical zoom
You probably heard in the lead-up to today that Samsung was ditching the 10x optical zoom lens on the Galaxy S24 Ultra. This is technically true, but 10x isn’t going away. Instead, Samsung opted to upgrade the second telephoto lens, making it a 50-megapixel 5x lens. This allows Samsung to crop into that lens to give you 10x optical zoom without destroying the quality at all. Now this lets you switch from 0.6x to 1x, to 2x, to 3x, to 5x, to 10x, with ease. It switches between the cameras super easily, too.
Of course, Space Zoom is still available on the Galaxy S24 series, with up to 100x on the Ultra and up to 30x on the S24 and S24 Plus.
Pre-orders are open now!
Pre-orders for the new Galaxy S24 series are open now, with units arriving on January 31. The Galaxy S24 starts at $799, the Galaxy S24 Plus at $999, and the Galaxy S24 Ultra at $1,299. As mentioned, only the Galaxy S24 starts at 128GB, while the other two start at 256 GB. However, Samsung is offering a free storage upgrade for pre-orders. So you can get 512GB of storage on the Galaxy S24 Plus or Galaxy S24 Ultra for the regular price, which is a really nice freebie.