Samsung's Galaxy S24 and S24 Plus don't have the larger screen or 5x telephoto camera of the more expensive Galaxy S24 Ultra, nor do they have its stylus. But in a year where “Galaxy ai” is pretty much the only thing Samsung wants to talk about, it looks like those differences will matter a little less than usual when these phones start shipping on January 31.
Yes, Samsung's suite of new ai-powered features are here, and perhaps the most important thing to know about Samsung's new S24 lineup is that they're the same whether you opt for the $799.99 Galaxy S24, the $999.99 Galaxy S24 Plus or the $1,299.99 Galaxy S24 Ultra. In the US, all phones use Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processors, which means the performance of the device's ai features should be similar.
Samsung also promises seven generations of operating system updates and seven years of security updates on all three phones, matching the impressive support period Google promised for its Pixel 8 line.
My colleague Allison Johnson has a rundown of the ai-powered features in her preview of the Galaxy S24 Ultra. It's a wide range, even if some of them are reminiscent of features from Google's Pixel line. (This is no coincidence: Samsung is ai-samsung-galaxy-s24-/”>relying on Google's fundamental Gemini models to power its ai features.) As an example, Samsung's Voice Memos app on phones can now transcribe your conversations, and there's also an option for the phone to automatically summarize the resulting transcript. For photo editing, there is a magic editorStyling feature that allows you to move subjects around the frame after taking a photo. The S24 series will also support Google's new Circle to Search trick.
Elsewhere, there's a previously teased feature that will offer real-time two-way translations of phone calls between 13 different languages, and will also provide text message translations. Samsung is also equipping this year's S24 lineup with a feature it calls “pitch adjustment” (essentially Samsung's version of Google's Magic Compose) that lets you adjust the pitch of written text in addition to offering more typical grammar and spelling suggestions. . Available ringtones include “professional,” “casual,” “#social,” “polite,” and “emojify.”
Some of these functions take place in the cloud, but there is more on the device than I expected. Samsung Notes, for example, relies on the cloud to automatically format your writing into a bulleted summary, and you'll also need an Internet connection for the phone to automatically adjust the tone of your writing. But the translation features built into the S24's keyboard and phone app are found on the device, as are photo editing suggestions. It's a real mix. If you prefer the security of knowing everything happens on the device, there's an option in settings to “process data only on the device,” at the expense of disabling some of the ai features and not getting the “best results” from others. .
Aside from their ai-infused features, the Galaxy S24 and S24 Plus are largely a continuation of what we saw with last year's S23 devices, but there are still some hardware upgrades to be found. The screens, for example, this year are bigger and brighter. They now measure 6.2 and 6.7 inches in size (a 0.1-inch improvement in both cases), with maximum brightnesses of 2,600 nits (up from 1,750 last year). And the S24 Plus now also features a 1440p resolution, instead of 1080p.
The main camera specifications are unchanged from last year. Both phones still feature triple camera setups, each consisting of a 50-megapixel main camera, a 12-megapixel ultra-wide-angle lens, and a 10-megapixel telephoto lens with 3x optical zoom. There are more interesting changes on the software side. In addition to the ai photo editing tricks mentioned above, there's also better support for HDR photos, which can now be taken in third-party social apps and not just the main camera app.
The two phones in North America are powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Galaxy processor, like the Galaxy S24 Ultra, while in Europe they use Samsung's Exynos 2400 Galaxy chip. (European S24 Ultra buyers get a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy.) Samsung says the suffix “for Galaxy” indicates that the processors in these phones have slightly higher performance than standard chips available on the market. similar to what we saw last year.
The S24 comes with 8GB of RAM and has the option of 128 or 256GB of storage in the US (European buyers get an additional 512GB storage option), while the S24 Plus has 12GB of RAM with 256 or 512 GB of storage. Battery capacities have increased slightly compared to last year (4000 mAh for the S24 and 4900 mAh for the S24 Plus), but the advertised maximum charging speeds are the same (25 W and 45 W, respectively). Both phones support wireless charging via Samsung's Fast Wireless Charging 2.0 up to 15W.
The S24 and S24 Plus have aluminum frames, instead of the S24 Ultra's titanium frames, and are protected with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2 instead of Corning Gorilla Armor. But you still get IP68 dust and water resistance ratings. Phone durability will be more important than ever given the software support periods Samsung promises; Ideally, the hardware should be equally durable. Available colors include black, grey, purple and yellow.
The rise of generative ai has come at a great time for Samsung. What could have been two relatively iterative updates to the company's flagship line of smartphones have become much more interesting thanks to a series of new ai features designed to help you with writing, photography, and general communication. These features certainly seemed capable in my brief, controlled time with the phones before today's announcement, although it will be very different under the stresses and strains of the real world.
While there's a part of me that suspects we'll eventually see some of these features on older Samsung phones with software updates, for now, it's a compelling argument for why even the flagship-level flagships are worth paying attention to. basic of the company this year.
Photography by Jon Porter / The Verge
