PUBLISHED March 21st, 2023 06:00 am | UPDATED March 7th, 2024 11:55 pm
As a long-time user of Samsung phones, I’ve always looked to the tech giant for leading-edge tech upgrades, like the S Pen and foldable phones. My last switch to the S22, launched in February 2022, left me with little motivation to explore the new S23 phones on my own. Until I was tasked to review the S23 Ultra and realised how much I was missing out. What is the game-changing technology? What do they do for our media-centric lifestyles? Let’s take a look.
A Look on the Outside
The S23 Ultra highly resembles, in build and form, to the S22 Ultra. Although similar to the eyes, the S23 Ultra feels more comfortable on the hands. It has a boxier feel that extends to the S Pen, which provides a better grip when writing. The curvature on the screen’s sides is slightly reduced, allowing more usable real estate in front while retaining the smooth glide across the screen. At the back, the Gorilla Victus 2 increases durability, with claims of improved resistance against scratches.
A Look on the Inside
Equipped with the latest Android 13 OS, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip processor and the One UI 5.1 chipset, the Samsung S23 Ultra certainly makes it easy to customise and design your way through the lock screen, wallpapers, and AR emojis to assist functions and setting up modes and routines.
The real deal-breaker comes in the form of Samsung’s proprietary Universal Flash Storage (UFS) 4.0, which allows the writing and storage of content twice as fast as before while consuming less power. While using the S23, apps definitely opened more quickly, games and movies ran smoother, multitasking got easier, and the battery lasted longer. Personally, this marks the end of my long-standing gripe with Samsung phones – particularly their infamous camera shutter lag too. This upgrade necessitates a larger memory storage, so the minimum size offered for S23 Ultra is 256GB.
Levelling Up Our Media-Centric Lifestyles
We consume so much media daily; whether we update our socials, learn new things, or keep ourselves entertained, we turn to our trusty companions – our smartphones.
Camera
It was baffling at first to see the S23 Ultra’s selfie camera scaled down to 12MP while its primary camera gets an upgrade to 200MP. It turns out that with the camera’s AI capabilities (pixel binning), images from both cameras preserve brightness better, thus yielding more vibrant colours and skin tones with sharper details. Definitely Instagram-ready!
Sometimes, the colours can turn out in tones cooler than in real life, affecting the overall colour accuracy – but nothing that its editing app can’t handle. Overall, the quality of the pictures does look more crisp and striking.
The main camera’s zoom functions remain the same at 3x, 10x and 100x. AI steps up the quality of pictures from zoom.
One upgrade of the camera lies in its epic night mode. The camera renders vivid images of the cityscapes at night, and it can capture more precise and detailed images even in low-lighting conditions. With photos looking so good, it does motivate me to take more of them.
Similarly, videos are looking sharper and more brilliant. Its stabilisation sensors are now supercharged with twice the motion range, so AV content are way less blurry in motion. Videos sound more focused with the phone’s improved noise reduction capabilities. Turning on the zoom-in mic function captures audio from the focused or zoomed-in area. In my test, it even omits my background chewing noises from the final output.
The increased performance speed optimises the Astrophoto mode in the camera’s Expert Raw function. Not only can I take pictures of the glittering night sky, but the app will even tell me what in the astral I am seeing. Keen to go further? Take a video of moving stars with AstroHyperlapse. It is worth noting that you will need at least an hour of recording time to capture the stars’ gradual movement. Using the hyper-lapse function, you can even shoot videos of cars in motion with streaking lights, moving clouds, and sunrise and sunsets – something that’ll change your nature travel vlogs forever.
Entertainment
Our favourite wind-down activities like gaming and binge-watching are optimised in the S23 Ultra. Even with resolution settings set to the max for some games, there’s no glitch or lag during the gameplay. Binge-watching on Netflix was clear and smooth, with a louder volume coming from the speakers. And tuning into Spotify, I was pleasantly surprised by the clean and full audio as well, thanks to a much welcomed speaker upgrade.
Battery and Charging
Even with its impressive performance speed, a full charge on the S23 Ultra easily sees one through the day. Between taking pictures and videos at media events and streaming animal videos on Youtube, its battery life allows me to keep up with trends on Instagram and TikTok, do some online shopping, and even squeeze in an episode of Physical 100.
Wireless charging is a feature of the S23 Ultra’s 5,000mAh cell. At 15 watts, the wireless charging may not be up to speed with some Chinese brands (up to 50 watts here), but it is on par with iPhone 14. A 10-minute wired charge powered up the phone by 20%, with full charges completed in under an hour. The phone also features reverse charging capabilities, which means you can charge your earbuds and wearables from your phone.
Final Thoughts
The Samsung S23 Ultra has certainly raised my expectations. If, like me, capturing snippets of life with quality photos and videos or taking pictures for work is important to you, then this will give you those amazing photos and videos without complicated equipment. The 6.8” display is conducive for both work and play, and with its faster performance speed, multitasking is a breeze. With its sharp images, full sound, and smooth gaming experience, it’s the perfect tool for rewarding my child with a game or two.
Starting at S$1,828, the price tag is quite hefty. Shave that off with their launch promotions, including a S$200 overtrade value when you trade in your old phone and a S$250 e-voucher to purchase other accessories.
Buy Samsung S23 Ultra online for exclusive promotions and deals. Terms and conditions apply.
Photos in this review are unfiltered.