Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra review: The smartphone with galactic power and a 200 MP camera

[Redaktion]

The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra builds on the strengths of its predecessor and, in addition to comprehensive high-end hardware, again offers an integrated S Pen. On top of this, the model is launching globally with the brand-new Snapdragon processor. However, our review reveals that the smartphone is not entirely without criticism.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Samsung-Galaxy-S23-Ultra-review-The-smartphone-with-galactic-power-and-a-200-MP-camera.698336.0.html

[Sategi]

This is so sad, so excellent phone but with pwm around 240-250hz :(

[USZ]

That's just OLED in general, though it does seem a bit odd as 240-250 Hz flicker is usually found in 60 Hz panels and 120 Hz panels usually flicker at 480-500 Hz. I wonder why OEM's insist on using such low freq.'s, is it to help preserve battery life?

I hope Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 releases soon. Not that I need the performance but hopefully it'll drive down the prices of SD 8 Gen 2 phones, which is enough for me.

Does anyone know if the regular Galaxy S23 has decent enough zoom (e.g. space zoom, optical/telephoto zoom)? Heard Samsung heavily nerfs camera performance unless you go for absolute top end ultra model.

[S.Yu]

Interesting...this is probably the boxiest, and best looking Samsung in ages, yet the camera is quite frankly bad at this point, the performance rather resembles that of primitive quad bayer ~5-6 years ago, including the artifacts. If they want to demonstrate this...no longer even nonacell(what do they call a 16-1 bin?), they need to release it properly readied, not like this engineering sample...or is there an actual advantage at all? I haven't noticed Sony releasing a 16-1 bin nor even 9-1 bin.
I haven't been really paying attention to the recent Samsungs due to the mediocrity but the lack of microSD in a device this size still isn't really excusable, they're not Apple, the performance isn't Apple, the only real advantage of this model is, again, the S-Pen.

[Conflicted]

Are there any androids which support microSD card anymore? Afaik, LG were among the last to offer it but no longer doing phones. I guess there's maybe Sony but I've not looked at them in ages since they tend to have as bad pricing as Apple/Samsung.

Maybe manufacturers / OEMs are moving away from microSD because like 3.5 mm jack, having additional holes in a device makes it harder to waterproof certify.

I also feel conflicted with external storage. My last phone died and I lost all my photos on it which were valuable to me. Having them on microSD would of prevented this. On the other side, whenever someone implements microSD card support they always add the slowest card readers. I tried the steam deck briefly and internal storage was way faster than microSD. 

I kind of wish there more more devices out there which implemented super fast external storage like microSD Express which uses PCIe and based on NVMe standard.

[S.Yu]

Maybe manufacturers / OEMs are moving away from microSD because

There is no "because", "because" greed "because". Phones years ago waterproofed the holes and they can now, no change in design prevents that.

[PWM]

PWM flickering = no buy

[Eu]

"Display - Bright and eye-friendly LTPO AMOLED" - eye-friendly? Really? At 120 hz PWM this thing is terrible for eyes not friendly...

[nukmichael]

Hope to see S23 plus review

[Noobhater]

"Display - Bright and eye-friendly LTPO AMOLED" - eye-friendly? Really? At 120 hz PWM this thing is terrible for eyes not friendly...

Did you even read the article you noob?

[Eu]

"Display - Bright and eye-friendly LTPO AMOLED" - eye-friendly? Really? At 120 hz PWM this thing is terrible for eyes not friendly...

Did you even read the article you noob?

Yes, I read the article, and this screen is bad for eyes, what's your point clown?

[Tim Morrison]

Camera Awful?
Replace it. Couldn't be happier with camera.
A couple more updates and I'll be overjoyed

[NikoB]

theregister.com/2023/03/13/samsung_fake_moon_pics/

[meeeeeeeeeeee]

ouf, I'm not a fan of the image processing on the iphone, but they are so much less smothered by smoothing.