With AI, Samsung’s New Galaxy S24 Phones Have Strong Features that iPhones Don’t

At its first Unpacked event of 2024, held in San Jose, the heart of Silicon Valley, Samsung announced on Wednesday the Galaxy S24 series, comprised of the S24, S24+, and S24 Ultra.

Like clockwork, the new Samsung phones come with the latest chips and camera tech, and sport more durable and sleeker designs (the S24 Ultra has a titanium frame just like the iPhone 15 Pro).

However, their main selling points involve the biggest buzzword in tech right now: AI. Samsung calls its specific brand of AI features for its devices “Galaxy AI,” but it’s just fancy marketing for what we all know as generative AI. With Galaxy AI, Samsung is making it easier to do certain tasks and others that previously weren’t possible or required additional apps or technical expertise.

By hitching its Galaxy phones to AI, Samsung is hoping to offer enough differentiation from other Android phones that have eaten into its global sales. The new AI features could also help reignite the fierce competitive spirit from the early days between Galaxy phones and iPhones. With Galaxy AI, Samsung’s phones again have a strong set of features that iPhones do not.

Galaxy S24 and S24+

If you were hoping for new Samsung phones with some kind of hardware twist, you’re going to be disappointed. The Galaxy S24 series, particularly the S24 and S24+, play things safe again. That’s not surprising since bar-style smartphones have pretty much reached their final form factor.

Once again, the Galaxy S24 and S24+ share many hardware similarities. Both have more durable “Armor aluminum” mid-frames and come in four colors (Amber Yellow, Cobalt Violet, Marble Gray, Onyx Black), both are powered by Qualcomm’s newest Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip, and both phones have the same triple-lens rear camera system (a 50-megapixel main, 12-megapixel ultra-wide, and 10-megapixel telephoto with 3x optical zoom) and front-facing selfie camera (12 megapixels).

The differences are in the details. The S24 has a 6.2-inch display with FHD+ resolution and the S24+ has a 6.7-inch screen with QHD+ resolution. The same goes for battery capacity: The S24 has a 4,000 mAh battery while the S24+ has a 4,900 mAh battery. Fast wired charging is different, too: The S24 charges up to 50 percent in about 30 minutes with a 25W adapter and the S24+ up to 65 percent with a 45W brick. Additionally, the S24 has 8GB of RAM and less storage (128GB or 256GB) compared to the S24+, which has 12GB of RAM and 256GB or 512GB storage options.

Galaxy S24 Specs

• Display: 6.2-inch FHD+ Dynamic 2X AMOLED display with 1-120Hz refresh rate
• Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3
• RAM: 8GB
• Storage: 128GB or 256GB
• Battery: 4,000 mAh with 25W wired charging / fast wireless charging / Wireless PowerShare reverse wireless charging
• Rear cameras: 50-megapixel main f/1.8 + 12-megapixel ultra-wide f/ 2.2 (120-degree FOV) + 10-megapixel telephoto with 3x optical zoom f/2.4
• Selfie camera: 12-megapixel f/2.2
• Software: One UI 6.1 (Android 14)
• IP rating: IP68 water and dust-resistance
• Biometrics: In-display fingerprint reader
• Wireless: Wi-Fi 6E / Bluetooth 5.3
• Colors: Amber Yellow, Cobalt Violet, Marble Gray, Onyx Black

Galaxy S24+ Specs

• Display: 6.7-inch QHD+ Dynamic 2X AMOLED display with 1-120Hz refresh rate
• Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3
• RAM: 12GB
• Storage: 256GB or 512GB
• Battery: 4,900 mAh with 45W wired charging / fast wireless charging / Wireless PowerShare reverse wireless charging
• Rear cameras: 50-megapixel main f/1.8 + 12-megapixel ultra-wide f/ 2.2 (120-degree FOV) + 10-megapixel telephoto with 3x optical zoom f/2.4
• Selfie camera: 12-megapixel f/2.2
• Software: One UI 6.1 (Android 14)
• IP rating: IP68 water and dust-resistance
• Biometrics: In-display fingerprint reader
• Wireless: Wi-Fi 6E / Bluetooth 5.3
• Colors: Amber Yellow, Cobalt Violet, Marble Gray, Onyx Black

And since you’re probably wondering how the S24 and S24+ compare to their predecessors, the S23 and S23+, I’ll save you a Google search. The S24 has a 0.1-inch larger screen and 100 mAh larger battery; the S24+ has a 0.1-inch bigger display with more pixels (QHD+ instead of FHD+) and 200 mAh more battery capacity.

Choosing between the two new Galaxy phones really comes down to display size and resolution, battery capacity, storage, and price.

Galaxy S24 Ultra

The Galaxy S24 Ultra is the new phone with the biggest glow-up. It’s a clear descendant of the S23 Ultra and S22 Ultra that came before it, which are both successors to the now-abandoned Galaxy Note series.

Mirroring the iPhone 15 Pro / 15 Pro Max, Samsung switched to a titanium mid-frame on the S24 Ultra. The S24 Ultra will be available in Titanium Black, Titanium Gray Titanium Violet, and Titanium Yellow.

The 6.8-inch QHD+ resolution screen is the same size as the S23 Ultra’s, but this time, Samsung’s made it completely flat (works better with the included S Pen) and the bezels around it are equally sized; no more slightly thicker “chin” at the bottom of the display. The display is also 40 percent brighter at peak brightness (2,600 nits versus 1,750 nits on the S23 Ultra) and is 75 percent less reflective, according to Samsung.

Like the S24 and S24+, the brain of the S24 Ultra is the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip. There is one difference on the S24 Ultra: It comes with a vapor chamber cooling system that spans almost the entire footprint of the phone. With such a larger thermal dissipator, 3D gaming should run cooler and more optimally with less throttling.

The most noticeable hardware change year-over-year is to the second telephoto lens on the rear quad-camera system. Replacing the 10-megapixel telephoto lens with 10x optical zoom is a 50-megapixel telephoto with 5x optical zoom. That sounds like a major downgrade, but Samsung is claiming it’s not. Instead of digital zoom (read: lower quality) between 3x and 10x as on the S23 Ultra, you now get 3x and 5x optical zoom, and then everything from 5x to 10x is a crop-in on the center of the 50-megapixel sensor. With a 50-megapixel sensor and larger aperture (f/3.4), 10x photos on the S24 Ultra should look better in low-light compared to the S23 Ultra’s 10-megapixel f/4.9 shots.

Speaking of low-light photography, Samsung says the S24 Ultra takes better night photos across the board thanks to larger sensor pixels that can absorb more photons and, as a result, create brighter details.

And because the S24 Ultra is Samsung’s most premium bar-style phone, it gets faster Wi-Fi 7 connectivity instead of Wi-Fi 6E on the S24 and S24+.

Galaxy S24 Ultra Specs

• Display: 6.8-inch QHD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X display with 1-120Hz refresh rate
• Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3
• RAM: 12GB
• Storage: 256GB, 512GB, 1TB
• Battery: 5,000 mAh with 45W wired charging / fast wireless charging / Wireless PowerShare reverse wireless charging
• Rear cameras: 200-megapixel main f/1.7 + 12-megapixel ultra-wide f/2.2 (120-degree FOV) + 10-megapixel telephoto with 3x optical zoom f/2.4 + 50-megapixel telephoto with 5x optical zoom f/3.4
• Selfie camera: 12-megapixel f/2.2
• Software: One UI 6.1 (Android 14)
• IP rating: IP68 water and dust-resistance
• Biometrics: In-display fingerprint reader
• Wireless: Wi-Fi 7 / Bluetooth 5.3
• Colors: Titanium Black, Titanium Gray, Titanium Violet, Titanium Yellow

Galaxy AI Features

As I said earlier, Samsung’s new hardware is relatively tame this year. It’s simply a vessel for Galaxy AI. Much like Google is doing with its Pixel 8 and 8 Pro, Samsung has sprinkled generative AI in as many places as it could, many of them with actual daily utility, in my opinion.

One of the highlights is “Circle to Search with Google,” a feature that lets you draw a circle around text, images, and videos, and the Samsung phone will automatically search for it on Google. A pop-up slides in from the bottom with search results.

Live Translate allows you to translate calls from one language to another. When enabled during a call, the feature dictates what you say into the language that you selected so that the person on the other end doesn’t need to switch tongues, and vice versa. Samsung says Live Translate works in up to 13 languages and 17 dialects.

There’s also a Chat Assist feature that uses AI to translate text messages in real-time; there are even Writing Style settings that can rewrite your messages based on tone. For example, if you choose a “social” tone, the AI will add appropriate emoji and generate hashtags; a professional tone would read more formal than a casual one. It’s like Grammarly, but built right into the S24 phones.

Other Galaxy AI features include a way to summarize lengthy documents in Samsung Notes; the app lets you choose between “standard” and “detailed” summaries. The voice recorder app has a new feature called Transcript Assist that transcribes audio in real-time, separating transcriptions when there’s a different speaker. It’s similar to what you get with the Recorder app on Pixel phones. Samsung’s version does more, though, with the ability to translate transcriptions into other languages.

Even the camera systems and photo editor have useful Galaxy AI features. For instance, regular videos (any resolution 4K or lower) can be turned into smooth slow-motion videos with a long press on the content. Photos taken with the S24 Ultra’s 5x optical zoom lens can be converted into portrait photos and AI can also detect reflections and shadows and automatically remove them with a tap. Existing features like Object Eraser are better at generating background fill based on the context of an image.

Galaxy S24 Series U.S. Release Date and Pricing

Now that you know what’s up with the Galaxy S24, S24+, and S24 Ultra, let’s talk purchase details. All three Android phones come out on January 31 in the U.S.

For pricing, the S24 starts at $799.99, the S24+ starts at $999.99, and the S24 Ultra starts at $1,299.99. Eagle-eyed consumers will notice the S24 Ultra got a $100 price hike over the S23 Ultra, while the pricing on the other two models is the same as before.