Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra Review

Last year, when I checked out the Galaxy S22 Ultra, there were quite a lot of things I liked about it. The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra doesn’t break the mould too much, so rather than retyping what I wrote last year, I will focus on what has changed. 

Like the S22 Ultra in more ways than one

If you have a Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra, then this phone will feel familiar. It has the same black, rectangular shape that I liked. It isn’t the easiest to use with one hand without a popsocket or something to slip your fingers into. But then this phone isn’t designed for one-handed use. I mean, it comes with a S-Pen after all.

Speaking of the S-Pen, like with the S22 Ultra, it is tidily hidden away in the bottom left corner of the phone. A push in and it pops out for easy use. I did accidentally pop it out more this year than last, but I can’t guarantee I don’t have more crap in my pockets or have picked up the phone differently than I used to, so this isn’t necessarily a phone fault but an anecdote worth sharing. 

Like the S22 Ultra, the S23 Ultra also has a fantastic screen. Watching anything on it looked amazing; playing games on it looked amazing; it’s a damn good screen. Given that’s what you use your phone for these days, that’s kind of important. The phone is also more powerful, and anything I threw at it worked like a charm. To be fair, I found the same thing with last year’s phone. These beasts are pretty grunty.

So what’s different?

The two biggest changes are in the battery life and cameras. I wasn’t that impressed with the battery life last year, as I regularly cut it close at the end of the day for a charge. This time, despite having the same capacity battery, it seems to be way more efficient. I had heaps of spare battery life at the end of a day and sometimes managed to scrape a second day out of it.

The other thing is the cameras. A lot of them are the same size as last year but with a sweet 200-megapixel (MP) wide-angle sensor. I was blown away by the zoom. Zooming in and out flicks between cameras and I could get some incredible detail when zooming in. I took some snaps in some pretty crappy lighting conditions like the Upper Hutt Carnival of Lights and the photos came out incredible. 

So should you upgrade?

If you are already rocking a S22 Ultra then it is a pretty hard sell as that is a damn good phone in its own right and the new phone is $2300. The phone isn’t the fanciest looking, but what it lacks in snazziness it makes up for in a solid reliable build that is easy to use. If you have been tossing up between the two, the minor upgrades and much better battery life would push me towards the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra.