Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra review: Another Ultra Performance

Canstar Blue has the lowdown on the Galaxy S24, so you know whether it’s worth the cost.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra review: quick summary

It’s not secret that the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is one of the most expensive phones on the market. So it’s safe to say that you’d expect pretty much the best of the best in features and performance and extra functionality thanks to the inclusion of the S Pen. Luckily the S24 Ultra delivers just that – an all-round performance that’s hard to beat. But for its $2500 price tag, it’s not a phone suited to everyone.

The cameras deliver one of the best photo and video experiences you can get in a smartphone, although with so many lenses and bonus features, you can struggle to get the shots you want at times.
The Ultra’s powerful processor delivers a fast and smooth performance, and its upgraded cooling technology means it doesn’t run as hot during gaming sessions as some other phones do.
With a big battery, the S24 Ultra can easily keep up with your day-to-day needs, and you can even stretch out the battery over a couple of days with light to moderate usage.

Pros	Cons
Slim design and premium finish combine to create a sleek phone to look at and hold	Cameras struggle to focus at times and there’s a lot of lens switching when taking closeup shots
S Pen is just as good as ever and still fun to use, adding extra functionality	Focus on AI enhancements and tools rather than more tech upgrades
Night and low light photos really show what the cameras can do	Prices start at around $2500 – more expensive than its predecessor

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra specs and features

From $2499
6.8-inch Edge Quad HD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X screen
12MP front camera
Quadruple camera set-up in rear (200MP wide, 12MP ultra-wide, 50MP telephoto, 10MP telephoto)
In-screen ultra-sonic fingerprint sensor and facial recognition
Android 14 operating system with One UI 6.1
5000mAh battery, Fast Wireless Charging 2.0, PowerShare
IP68 water and dust resistance
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor for Galaxy
5G connectivity
S Pen support
256GB, 512GB and 1TB storage
Available in Titanium Grey, Titanium Black, Titanium Violet and Titanium Yellow

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Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra review: Another Ultra Performance – in this story we cover:

Samsung has kind of hit the limit when it comes to the flashy features, so it’s no surprise that its focus would be on extras like AI tools, rather than big tech upgrades. This might be justification for the bigger price tag, but it also indicates that Samsung has maybe hit a bit of a wall when it comes to how to upgrade the Ultra phone in the S series.

However, with that big price tag comes one of the most premium phones on the market, with the best of the best features that Samsung has to offer and one of the best camera performances in a smartphone.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra design

Samsung is playing it safe with the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra design, with a very similar look and feel to its predecessor, the S23 Ultra (and the S22 Ultra before that). Perhaps the biggest difference is its slightly squarer edges and the new Titanium frame, hot on the tail of the new titanium build Apple introduced with the iPhone 15 Pro. You’ll also get the S Pen neatly hidden in the bottom left of the phone. The S24 Ultra is a phone that looks and feels premium, thanks to the sleek-looking matte finish on the back, although it does show fingerprint smudges rather easily (something I experienced with the S23 Ultra).

Samsung S24 Ultra colours

You’ll have the option of four colours to choose from – Titanium Black, Grey, Violet and Yellow – although the Samsung online store carries Titanium Blue, Green and Orange options. I was supplied with the Titanium Grey version, which is a very warm tone, kind of a mix between silver and gold – it was very similar to the ‘Natural’ colour used for the iPhone 15 Pro. It’s a nice colour, offering something a little different to a standard silver or dark grey and not as boring as grey phones tend to be.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra functionality

The S24 Ultra is one of the biggest phones around. While its slim design makes it easier to hold, I struggled to operate the phone one-handed, especially navigating across the screen – if you have bigger hands, this most likely won’t be a problem for you.

The S Pen is neatly tucked away but easy to access and use, although I had an error message on one occasion stating that the S Pen was disconnected, but the pen was working at the time.

Fingerprint scanning and facial recognition is smooth and seamless. However, the fingerprint scanner doesn’t show you where on the screen to scan your fingerprint when the screen is locked. This meant I would inadvertently be touching the scanner and then have the phone read my incorrect fingerprint and lock me out of another attempt for a short period. Although it was a minor inconvenience, fingerprint unlocking isn’t something I would expect to have issues with on a phone this expensive.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra display and audio

The Galaxy S24 Ultra packs in a 6.8-inch Edge Quad HD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X display with up to 120Hz refresh rate and 2600 nits with built-in stereo speakers. Samsung touts the display as its brightest adaptive display to date, and testing this out in bright, direct sunlight, I was impressed by how visible the screen is. If you spend a lot of time outdoors and find the bright sun makes using your phone difficult, this bright display might just be what you need.

As you’d expect from one of Samsung’s most premium smartphone experiences, the screen quality is excellent. It’s smooth, clear and vibrant and looks great no matter what you’re doing, but watching videos is an absolute stand-out, especially thanks to the large screen. The high refresh rate makes scrolling through social media a breeze, although I feel like for the premium phone, Samsung could roll out a higher refresh rate – something Motorola is already doing with premium phones like the Razr 40 Ultra.

The built-in speakers also offer a fairly impressive performance. The sound is clear and immersive, making for an excellent experience if you’re watching videos without headphones. I felt that it was lacking a little bit of a bass boost that would really give it a more dynamic experience when playing music through the speakers, although this is really nitpicking.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra cameras

The Galaxy S24 Ultra cameras include a quad rear camera setup with 200MP wide, 12MP ultra-wide, 50MP telephoto and 10MP telephoto cameras, along with a 12MP front-facing camera. The S24 Ultra is packed with all sorts of AI enhancements and editing tools so you can get the most from your shots.

With some of the best cameras you can get in a smartphone, my expectations were high. And luckily the S24 Ultra delivered. It does a great job at outdoor and indoor photos, with clear and vibrant results, along with very true-to-life colours. Samsung does tend to give your photos a vibrancy boost in post, and it was especially noticeable when browsing the photo gallery. Fine for most shots but not great if you’re trying to capture a darker or moodier pic.

I also felt like Samsung’s enhancements detracted from the photo taking experience at times – for example, the ‘focus enhancer’ that pops up when you get closer to an object. It’s great if you want to keep everything in focus; but if you’re trying to capture macro shots or have one part of your photo in focus and a nice background blur on the rest, you end up with the cameras switching back and forth as it goes in and out of focus. You can turn this mode off when the icon pops up on screen, but if you’re operating the phone one-handed and you have short thumbs like I do, it’s impossible to reach across to this button. For a phone that Samsung goes all out for when it comes to its camera experience, these sorts of fiddly features can be a pain if you’re seriously into phone photography.

Low light and night is where the S24 Ultra really shines. You’ll get some great results in low light and night conditions where there is both minimal lighting and lots of lighting. In situations with virtually no light source, the S24 Ultra does an excellent job at capturing a lot of detail. Using standard mode and then switching night mode on makes a huge difference, especially for night sky photos. I found that taking these night shots was very hard though and there were a lot of blurry results, especially of the moon. You’ll need a very steady hand or tripod for the best shots.

The S24 Ultra can also capture great detail, but as already mentioned, the auto focus features can make this a much harder job than it needs to be. With no dedicated macro mode, you’ll need a lot of patience along with trial and error to get those detailed shots right. When you do, the results are very impressive. Although at times I was surprised when looking back at photos I’d taken, some shots were blurry, when you really wouldn’t expect them to be. That’s why patience and taking several shots is your best bet.

Portrait photos are also pretty impressive and you can control the strength of your background blur, which I thought was a nice touch. You’ll get some great portrait shots, but like most phones, you can get some blurring around the subject around finer details like hair and fur.

You’ll also get an impressive zoom capable of capturing great quality shots of far away subjects.

The video quality is, as you would expect, excellent. I also tested video at the live music show and found the picture and audio was very impressive, with minimal picture noise and no noticeable audio distortion.

Overall, the S24 Ultra cameras deliver one of the best photo taking and video recording experiences available in a smartphone – which you would expect for the price. For the average user, it might be a little bit too flashy for your needs. But for more serious phone photographers, you’ll be happy with what you get, but you might need some patience and trial and error to get the best results. But with AI editing tools, you may be able to fix some of this in post.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra performance

You’ll get a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor for Galaxy, which offers one of the best performances available in a smartphone. As you would expect, you’ll get a powerful and fast performance that can well and truly keep up with your day-to-day needs. Testing 5G speeds, I was able to record an average speed of 615.39Mbps.

Samsung touts the S24 Ultra processor as offering faster processing for better gameplay and a larger size Vapour Chamber to improve heat dissipation. It delivered a fast and smooth gaming experience and while it heated up during a longer gaming session (around 30 minutes), it was just running warm and not hot like what I’ve experienced with the Pixel 8 and the iPhone 15 Pro.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra features

Samsung has touted its Galaxy AI features as a big drawcard for the S24 Ultra, however much of this is powered by Android (and you’ll get many of these features on a Google Pixel). Circle to search is one of the main AI tools being promoted, and it’s definitely a handy feature to have. It works well – especially when using the S Pen – but I feel it isn’t a feature you would use too often. Which is how I feel about many of the AI features included with the S24 series. Some of the photo editing tools are fun to play around with, but I’m still not really sold on their usefulness (although Google’s magic eraser tool is probably the handiest).

However, that doesn’t mean others won’t find them useful features to have included. I just feel like a bit more of a tech upgrade, rather than Google-powered AI, would have given the S24 Ultra little more value for money.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra battery and charging

The S24 Ultra has the same 5000mAh battery capacity as its predecessor, but Samsung claims you can get up to 30 hours of video playback on the S24 Ultra compared to 26 hours on the S23 Ultra.

I found the battery life of the S24 Ultra was pretty good at keeping up with my day-to-day usage, and I was even able to get a couple of days of moderate usage from a single charge. Around 12 hours of moderate usage (gaming, video streaming, web and social browsing with regular idle periods) drained 22% of the battery. Getting down to the details, there was a 4% battery drop from 50 minutes of Netflix streaming, a 3% drop from 30 minutes of HD YouTube streaming, while there was a 2% battery drain from just 17 minutes of gaming.

Using a 45W fast charger, I was able to charge the S24 Ultra from 0% to 100% in one hour and 17 minutes. 10 minutes of charging boosted the battery up to 29%, while 20 minutes boosted the battery to 82%.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra price NZ

The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra doesn’t come cheap and is by far one of the most expensive smartphones currently on the New Zealand market. The 256GB version is $2449 NZ RRP, the 512GB version is $2699 NZ RRP, while the 1TB S24 Ultra is $3099 NZ RRP.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra phone plans

If you want to pick up the Galaxy S24 Ultra on a phone plan, you can buy it from 2Degrees, One NZ and Spark and pay your device off over the following timeframes:

2Degrees: 12, 24 or 36 months
One NZ: 12, 24 or 36 months
Spark: 12, 18, 24 or 36 months

You can also buy your phone outright from the same providers. Otherwise, if you buy your S24 Ultra outright, you’ll typically need to pair it with a mobile phone plan.

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Should I buy the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra?

As you would expect, there’s little to fault about the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. It is pretty much one of the best value phones your money can buy – the only downside is that it is also one of the most expensive phones on the market.

The S Pen and upgraded cameras are by far some of the biggest draw cards for the S24 Ultra. You will get a great all-round camera performance, including powerful up-close shots with great detail and special night photography features. The S Pen might seem like a gimmick but I do find myself drawn to using it often, even for just scrolling through social media. I can see how it’s one of those features you might not think you need but then it easily slots into how you use your phone.

Ultimately the S24 Ultra offers a fantastic all-round performance that you won’t be disappointed in. However, its steep price point might be off-putting for some. If you have the money to spend and you want all the flashy features and extras, then it would be worth it. However, for the average user, especially if you don’t have as much cash to splash around, you might find you’d be better off with the standard S24 or S24+.

Consider the Galaxy s24 Ultra if:	Don’t consider the Galaxy S24 Ultra if:
You want the best-of-the-best features, have the cash to spend, love taking photos on your smartphone and want the added functionality of the S Pen.	You don’t tend to take too many photos, have a tighter budget and don’t really need the S Pen for daily usage.

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra vs S23 Ultra specs

Want to see how the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra compares to the S23 Ultra? Check out the specs for each phone below.

	Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra	Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra
Price	From $2499	$1212
Display	6.8-inch QHD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X display, 2,600 nits peak brightness, up to 120Hz refresh rate	6.8-inch QHD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X display, 1,750 nits peak brightness, up to 120Hz refresh rate
Battery	5000mAh	5000mAh
Chipset	Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor for Galaxy	Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor for Galaxy
Storage	256GB, 512GB, 1TB	256GB, 512GB
Rear camera	Quad camera setup in rear (200MP wide, 12MP ultra-wide, 50MP telephoto, 10MP telephoto)	Quad camera setup in rear (200MP wide, 12MP ultra-wide, 10MP telephoto, 10MP telephoto)
Front camera	12MP	12MP
Material	Titanium frame with Corning Gorilla Armor	Armour Aluminium Frame with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2
Extras	S Pen compatibility, 5G connectivity, IP68 water and dust resistance	S Pen compatibility, 5G connectivity, IP68 water and dust resistance
Colours	Titanium Grey, Titanium Black, Titanium Violet and Titanium Yellow	Cream, Green, Lavender and Phantom Black

About the reviewer of this page

This report was written by Emma Bradstock and reviewed by Canstar Content Producer, Caitlin Bingham. Caitlin is an experienced writer whose passion for creativity led her to study communication and journalism. She began her career freelancing as a content writer, before joining the Canstar team.

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