In addition, US wireless carriers have revealed C-band 5G plans that the S21 Ultra is well positioned to take advantage of, and the phone is now widely available for less than its high list price. It’s a solid and premium-feeling phone with a unique (for the US) superzoom camera, a gorgeous screen, and future-forward network chops. The S21 Ultra sets the bar for Android performance in 2021 and its superzoom camera will lead you to look at the world in new ways. Samsung has three models in its 2021 flagship Galaxy S series: the small S21, the medium S21 Plus, and the large S21 Ultra.
The S21 Ultra is $999.99 at both Amazon and Best Buy at this writing, and Samsung has an intense trade-in game. That makes the S21 Ultra effectively less expensive than the iPhone 12 Pro Max ($1,099), which is rarely discounted.
My review unit is a solid matte block that resists fingerprints much better than last year’s glossy models. Slots and ports in general are, alas, going the way of the dodo; not enough people use them, and built-in memory has faster performance.
It hasn’t scratched after a few days of testing, an improvement over the Galaxy S20+ screen, which scuffed up quickly. Samsung says that the screen is 25% brighter than the Galaxy S20 Ultra, at 1,500 nits maximum brightness. You can set the screen resolution to 1080p or quad HD to save battery and increase game frame rates, but the option to manually switch between 60Hz and 120Hz refresh rates is now gone; instead, the display automatically changes from 10Hz up to 120Hz depending on what you’re looking at. The Ultra is the only member of the S21 family that works with Samsung’s S Pen, the active, pressure-sensitive stylus previously reserved for the Note series.
The S21 has the same super-low 9ms latency as the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, updating the screen with its virtual ink at 120Hz. We’ve heard rumors that there may be no Galaxy Note phone this year because of a global processor shortage.
As always, there are a bunch of different sub-models of the Galaxy S21, noted by a letter at the end of the product number. The U model has a single SIM slot, a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, disabled e-SIM functionality, and all the appropriate bands for all US 5G networks, including millimeter wave and the upcoming C-band. The PCMark and AIMark benchmarks appear to be broken on the S21 Ultra, delivering scores that are obviously far too low. For instance, the 888’s image signal processor lets the S21 Ultra combine its two telephoto cameras for much better 10x–30x zoom than last year, and a new Director’s Mode video feature lets you smoothly switch between cameras on the fly. So even without reliable benchmark numbers to quantify speed and power, it’s clear that this is a big step up from last year’s models. The bloatware situation on the unlocked units isn’t bad at all, but you should expect the usual dozens of unwanted apps on carrier-locked models, especially on AT&T. Samsung gets rid of its unloved Bixby Home screen and puts Google’s browser front and center. It’s worth pointing out that Samsung does its best to link to other Galaxy devices and Windows laptops, similar to how iPhones hook up to Macs. On Windows laptops, you can answer texts, check notifications, or mirror your phone screen. You can also put the S21 in multi-windowed Dex mode for presentations on a big screen or use an additional keyboard and mouse.
Samsung’s home screen design still won’t be mistaken for Google’s, with its own colors, icons, and dialer. In our standard test, where we run a YouTube video with full screen brightness over Wi-Fi, we managed 11 hours and 20 minutes; that’s on par with other leading large phones. There’s a third-party app called Samsung Band Selector that might let you force your phone to use 4G, but it’s unsupported and could be disabled at any time. You can always opt to avoid the cable question altogether and get a Qi-compatible wireless charging pad.
Verizon says it’ll cover 100 million people with C-band access by next March, which will likely triple the carrier’s 5G speeds. Standalone 5G, which eschews 4G, gives you lower latency and less chance of overloaded networks in crowded conditions, but you end up with slower overall speeds because you’re losing the add-on 4G components.
By forcing the phone into non-standalone mode using a field test screen, speeds rose to 258Mbps down and 69Mbps up on average, with 26ms latency. This will become especially relevant when you’re hooking your phone up to multi-gigabit home internet service, when and if that appears in the next few years.
Samsung’s phones used to work with older credit card swipe machines that didn’t have the Apple/Samsung Pay specs. I was very happy to see that Wi-Fi calling was finally available on my unlocked model on all three major US wireless carriers.
The phone technically supports eSIM, but it’s been disabled on this model, and Samsung has shown no sign of intending to enable it. The S21 did much better at keeping different elements of a setup in focus, though its photos weren’t quite as sharp as those from the iPhone 12.
High-level zoom, which is really shaky on the S20 series, is now stabilized so it’s much easier to lock onto the part of the image you need. The big difference between this and the S20 generation is Night mode; the S21 has one, so you can finally take decent selfies in the dark. With good light, that front-facing camera is actually great, with more detail than the S20 Ultra, and better contrast than the iPhone 12. It was big and heavy, the list price was high, and carriers hadn’t released their C-band plans.
And the more uses I find for the 10x zoom and games I play on the big, bright screen, the more I appreciate just how well this phone is put together. Samsung has some accessories to sell you, too: a watch, earbuds, and a smart tag locator. The Note 20 comes with an S Pen and a microSD memory card slot, but the S21 Ultra is more future-facing as a long-term investment. The iPhone has nothing like the S21 Ultra’s superzoom, but it has somewhat better night performance and, for serious photographers, a much better ecosystem of third-party camera apps and integration with Mac computers.
The OnePlus 9 Pro has speedy, elegant software and is also a great choice, but the S21 noses just ahead of it on radio performance and superzoom. Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 4.5 Editors’ Choice See It $1,049.97 at Amazon MSRP $1,199.99 Pros Beautiful design and solid build Equipped for next-gen C-band and Wi-Fi 6E connectivity Cons Heavy The Bottom Line The Galaxy S21 Ultra delivers a high-quality superzoom camera that truly works, supports Samsung’s excellent S Pen, and sets the bar for smartphone features in 2021.
Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G review: Samsung’s premier phone is pretty badass
CNET’s expert staff reviews and rates dozens of new products and services each month, building on more than a quarter century of expertise. SCORE Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G $1,050 at Amazon $680 at Walmart Pros Gorgeous phantom black finish The Galaxy S21 Ultra gets a fresh design and sports a gorgeous black finish. It was a phone all about excess that, by sheer fate, was launched at the beginning of a global pandemic and recession.
Its bold, behemoth take on the Galaxy S line was undercut by its $1,400 (£1,199, AU$1,999) price and issues with its nearly domino-size camera system. And that’s why the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra earned a CNET’s Editors’ Choice Award. I wouldn’t call the S21 Ultra’s design radically different, but my review unit has the best black finish I’ve ever seen on a phone. The camera bump is large and melts into the sides of the phone, which are glossy black. And while the regular S21 and S21 Plus looks snazzy in their two-tone colors, the all-black S21 Ultra is cool, elegant and badass all at the same time. It has a Wide Quad HD resolution and a variable refresh rate between 10 and 120Hz, which is determined by what’s on the screen. Support for the S-Pen means you can draw, write, edit photos and sign documents on the S21 Ultra. The Galaxy Note phones line always tempted me, but I didn’t think I’d use the S-Pen enough to justify getting one.
Read more: S21 Ultra vs. iPhone 12 Pro Max vs. Pixel 5: Which phone has the best night mode? The two cameras are paired to help make zooming in, even at 100x, easier and more steady. Photos from the S21 Ultra are excellent, with good detail and a wide dynamic range.
There is a 108-megapixel mode, but I found that the 12-megapixel photos that come from pixel binning look consistently great. I used the single-take mode in the camera app to capture photos and videos of this cute dog. There’s so much for the S21 Ultra to capture correctly here: the barren tree branches, the water and the white fluffy clouds in the blue sky. Flaring on the lens is minimized and photos look bright without a bunch of image noise or noise-reduction smearing. You now have an option to change the color tone to either bright or natural which is excellent.
A downside to Director’s View is that the final video is saved in HD instead of 4K or 8K. I’d love to see a similar thumbnail preview interface of all the rear cameras when recording a regular 4K video.
I’m excited to pit the S21 Ultra and its cameras against the iPhone 12 Pro Max and Google Pixel 5. Powering the S21 Ultra is the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 chip, along with 12GB of RAM, or 16GB in the most expensive model — which also has 512GB of storage (see the chart below for prices).
Battery tests on the S21 Ultra for continuous video playback on Airplane mode clocked an average of 22 hours and 57 minutes with the refresh rate set to Auto 120Hz. Though keep in mind, in real world use my colleague Jessica Dolcourt found the S20 Ultra’s battery drained like it was being bitten by a “thirsty vampire.”
The Galaxy S21 Ultra runs Android 11 with Samsung’s OneUI 3.1 top layer. And with a phone this big, OneUI helps make it easier to use one-handed.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Display size, resolution 6.8-inch AMOLED 2X, 3,200×1,440 pixels 6.9-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X 6.9-inch; 3,088×1,440 pixels 6.7-inch; 2,400×1,080 pixels Pixel density 515 ppi 511ppi 496ppi 393ppi Dimensions (Inches) 2.97×6.5×0.35 in 2.99×6.57×0.35 in 6.49×3.04×0.31 in 6.36×2.96×0.33 in Dimensions (Millimeters) 75.6×165.1×8.9mm 76.0×166.9×8.8mm 164.8×77.2×8.1mm 161.6×75.2×8.3 mm Weight (Ounces, Grams) 8.07 oz; 229g 7.76 oz; 220g 7.33 oz, 208g 6.84 oz, 194g Mobile software Android 11 Android 10 Android 10 Android 10 Camera 108-megapixel (wide-angle), 12-megapixel (ultrawide), 10-megapixel (3x telephoto), 10-megapixel (10x telephoto) 108-megapixel (wide-angle), 48-megapixel (telephoto), 12-megapixel (ultrawide), time-of-flight camera 12-megapixel (ultrawide), 108-megapixel (wide-angle), 12-megapixel (telephoto) 12-megapixel (ultrawide), 12-megapixel (wide angle), 64-megapixel (telephoto) Front-facing camera 40-megapixel 40-megapixel 10-megapixel 10-megapixel Video capture 8K 8K 8K 8K Processor Snapdragon 888 Snapdragon 865 Plus Snapdragon 865 Plus Snapdragon 865 Plus Storage 128GB, 256GB, 512GB 128GB, 512GB 128GB, 512GB 128GB RAM 12GB, 16GB 12GB, 16GB 12GB 8GB Expandable storage No Up to 1TB Up to 1TB No Battery 5,000 mAh 5,000 mAh 4,500 mAh 4,300 mAh Fingerprint sensor In-screen In-screen In-screen In-screen Headphone jack No No No No Special features IP68 rating, 5G-enabled, 100x Space Zoom, 10W wireless charging, 10x optical zoom 5G enabled; 120Hz refresh rate; 100x zoom; water resistant (IP68) 120Hz screen refresh rate, 5x optical zoom, 120Hz display; UWB sharing, S-Pen stylus; 5G connectivity; Wireless PowerShare; water resistant (IP68) S-Pen stylus; 5G connectivity; Wireless PowerShare; water resistant (IP68) Price off-contract (USD) $1,200 (128GB), $1,250 (256GB), $1,380 (512GB) $1,399 (128GB), $1,599 (512GB) $1,300 (128GB), $1,450 (512GB) $1,000 Price (GBP) £1,149 (128GB), £1,199 (256GB), £1,329 (512GB) £1,199 (128GB), £1,399 (512GB) £1,179 £849 (4G) and £949 (5G) Price (AUD) AU$1,849 (128GB), AU$1,949 (256GB), AU$2,149 (512GB) AU$1,999 (128GB), AU$2,249 (512GB) AU$1,849 (4G) and $AU$1,999 (5G) AU$1,499 (4G) and AU$1,649 (5G)
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra review
The Galaxy S21 Ultra is the best Android phone yet with dual zoom lenses, a stellar display and excellent battery life. Why you can trust Tom’s Guide Our writers and editors spend hours analyzing and reviewing products, services, and apps to help find what’s best for you. For $1,199 — or $100 more than the iPhone 13 Pro Max — you a get dynamic 6.8-inch display and dual telephoto lenses for crazy zoom power. The Galaxy S21 Ultra comes in a sleeker design and offers faster performance from Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888 chip.
The dynamic display on the Galaxy S21 Ultra delivers a smooth 120Hz refresh rate and sharpest WQHD resolution at the same time. You can still find it from other retailers and wireless carriers, but make sure you’re paying less than the $1,199 debut price, as that will get you a newer Galaxy S22 Ultra.
Make sure you check our Samsung promo codes page for any remaining offers and discounts on this older phone. With its 0.35 inch profile and weight of 8.08 ounces, the S21 Ultra is thicker and heavier than the iPhone 12 Pro Max. The display is gently curved, unlike the fully flat regular Galaxy S21, but not annoyingly so. The colors are as rich as ever, and the viewing angles nice and wide when bing watching on Netflix. The S21 Ultra is also smart enough to automatically dial the refresh rate all the way down to 10Hz to help save on power. More good news, the S21 Ultra’s display is easy to read outdoors, because it can reach a peak rated brightness of 1,500 nits.
The colors on the iPhone were a bit more accurate, with its screen achieving a Delta-E score of 0.07, compared to 0.35 for the Galaxy S21 Ultra. I tested the camera out at a nearby store to capture a shot of produce, and the green peppers in the foreground look shiny and delicious.
You can make out fine detail in the bark, and the phone does a great job capturing the clouds against the blue sky even while dealing with all of the shadows in the foreground. I slightly prefer the S21 Ultra’s photo in this case to the iPhone 12 Pro Max, but it’s really close. Samsung says it has also improved the Portrait mode on the S21 by leveraging AI to better separate the subject from the background. The Galaxy S21 Ultra also performs quite well in low light, thanks to a faster Bright Night sensor and 12MP nona-binning technology for reducing noise reduction.
The S21 Ultra’s pic is overly bright and a bit washed out, while his fur his more golden and natural looking with the iPhone. And you can see live thumbnails of each camera while you’re recording video, so you can make a quick call if you want to switch.
With Super Steady mode on the S21 Ultra engaged, I captured smooth footage even as I walked fast up a hill.
It managed to capture my attempt at a reverse layup in slow mo and pick a pretty good photo at the top of the jump. The Galaxy S21 Ultra is one of the first phones powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888 chip, which is complemented by 12GB or 16GB of RAM. The S21 Ultra didn’t flinch as I sliced through multiple enemies in Grimvalor while delivering console-quality visuals.
That’s behind the iPhone 12 Pro Max, which cleared 4,100 and 1,600, but it’s still the best scores we’ve seen from an Android phone. Unfortunately, while you have a range of storage options to choose from for the S21 Ultra — 128, 256 or 512GB — Samsung ditched the microSD card slot. On our web surfing battery test over 5G, the S21 Ultra’s 5,000 mAh endured for 11 hours and 25 minutes. That beats the iPhone 12 Pro Max’s 10:53 and lands the Ultra on our best phone battery life list.
Yes, it’s the green thing to do, but if you haven’t bought a phone in the last couple of years and don’t have USB-C, it will mean more money coming out of your pocket. For the first time ever, a Galaxy S device supports the S Pen, the S21 Ultra makes that happen with a Wacom digitizer built into the display. The S Pen functionality worked pretty well, and you can enjoy features like Screen Off memo for quickly jotting down notes. The S Pen Pro ships later this year for an undisclosed price, which will include Bluetooth connectivity.
The Qualcomm X60 modem inside this device is capable of carrier aggregation, which should result in higher peak speeds while delivering better power efficiency. It’s not fantastic, but the iPhone 12 Pro Max mustered only 100 Mbps in the same location when I popped the same SIM card in that phone.
You can also use the SmartThings Find app to locate other Samsung devices, including phones, smartwatches, tablets and earbuds. The Galaxy S21 Ultra has the highest resolution main camera (108MP vs 64MP for S21 and Plus), the most powerful zooms (100x vs 30x) and the sharpest display (QHD vs 1080p).
Apple’s phone delivers faster performance from its A15 Bionic chip, and you get a strong Ceramic Shield front display that’s designed to be more durable. Apple really closed the gap this year by offering vastly improved battery life, a dynamic 120Hz display, and blistering performance.
If you’re platform-agnostic, there are few reasons to pick the Galaxy S21 Ultra over the iPhone 13 Pro Max. The Galaxy Z Fold 3 is Samsung’s latest foldable, showcasing the company’s prowess when it comes to display technology and hardware design. The Fold 3 is a big, powerful phone that Samsung has intended to succeed the venerable Galaxy Note line (RIP). This update brought Android 12, which offers several key improvements to the UI and privacy elements. While Samsung has modified something from what you’ll find on a Pixel phone, you can read our Android 12 review to learn more about what you can expect with the update.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra review
Caution: while it’s cheaper than last year’s ‘Ultra’ phone, it remains pricey for average consumers, and it doesn’t come with a microSD card slot nor does it include a charger. Having been replaced by the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra in 2022, it’s no longer the company’s benchmark for a true premium smartphone, but it’s still a worthy purchase. This is Samsung’s vision of smartphone excess for 2021: five cameras led by a 108MP sensor, two telephoto cameras, 100x zoom and 40MP selfies, plus 5G, all-day battery life and up to 16GB of RAM – all packed into an Android phone with a 6.8-inch 120Hz Quad HD display and an upgraded in-screen fingerprint sensor that has a 1.7x larger surface area than the one on last year’s phone.
Photos look sharp, dynamic range is impressive and Samsung’s ‘tripod lock’ software feature steadies the 30x and 100x zoom levels on subjects to prevent the viewfinder image from jumping around.
It’s much easier to pull off the 100x ‘Space Zoom’ now, although punching in 100x is limited to being a neat party trick due to grainy images, while 30x is passable in the right light. It’s the S21 Ultra’s 10x and 3x optical zoom levels that nailed the photos we wanted every time – more than any other smartphone telephoto camera.
Welcome amid an economic slowdown, the overhauled look and boost in performance haven’t led to a price increase over last year’s S20 Ultra – Samsung has actually made this phone significantly cheaper. We started out saying that the S21 Ultra is Samsung’s vision of excess, but you’ll have to let go of what doesn’t fit into the company’s roadmap.
You won’t find a charger inside of the box either; like Apple, Samsung cites e-waste as the reason the power brick isn’t included. If you only just got over the lack of a 3.5mm headphone jack in Samsung smartphones, brace yourself for these changes – we have seen some diehards in our YouTube video comments proclaim “no microSD, no sale”.
The launch event was January 14, meaning that both the official announcement and the release date were a month earlier than we’re used to for the company’s flagship smartphone. Risky, yes, but the finish of our review device – a matte Phantom Black with few seams – helped minimize the camera bump and fingerprints smudges.
Whatever color you choose, the matte finish of each is a significant improvement over last year’s S20 series, which had a reflective sheen that looked a little plasticky and cheap. For example, its large display stretches the hand at 6.8 inches, yet the curved edge-to-edge screen means that bezel is almost non-existent, and that 40MP front camera hides behind a tiny punch-hole that’s easy to ignore after a few minutes of watching a video. The Galaxy S21 Ultra screen is Samsung’s first (among smartphones) that’s capable of running at a smooth 120Hz refresh rate while in a pixel-packing Quad HD resolution.
The entire S20 series and Note 20 Ultra forced you to choose between 120Hz/60Hz and Quad HD/Full HD, while the new S21 and S21 Plus are stuck at Full HD+, with 120Hz enabled by default. We found the 6.8-inch body to be easier to grasp than the 6.7-inch iPhone 12 Pro Max, and that’s in large part thanks to the curved display and overall narrowness of Samsung’s device. The curved edges are subtle on the S21 Ultra, and not quite as pronounced as on past Samsung devices, and that means fewer errant presses.
We also tested the screen brightness of the Galaxy S20 Ultra outdoors, and it automatically amps up to a super-bright 1,500 nits when necessary. Samsung’s redesigned in-screen fingerprint sensor, which uses ultrasonic technology courtesy of Qualcomm, makes its debut on the Galaxy S21 series.
There’s 1.7x more surface area to this invisible biometric pad, and we found it was more forgiving of our often wayward thumb placement – that’s a relief given the fact that face unlock is useless at a time when we’re often hidden behind a mask. We were able to jot down quick notes and bring up all of the Air Command options, which include a variety of features you can use without touching the phone’s screen.
We may be able to go all Harry Potter in front of our smartphone again when the even more special S Pen Pro model launches later this year, but details are scarce on its extra functionality. What helps most at the 30x (and 100x) ranges is the new tripod lock feature, which prevents the viewfinder image from jumping around, something that could be jarring when zooming in that tightly on the S20 Ultra.
After a second, the S21 Ultra camera fixes onto a subject that it outlines in yellow on the small zoomed-out corner reticle, and the shakiness is magically dialed down. We’ve found it can overwrite your decision and pick which camera gets used (likely based on their different apertures and the lighting in your environment).
Year-over-year the biggest improvement is to the 108MP main camera, which made its debut in the S20 Ultra but was dogged with autofocus issues at launch.
The iPhone 12 Pro series still wins out for many non-zoomed photos, especially indoor and nighttime shots, but Samsung and its more finely tuned night mode (it doesn’t simply bump up the exposure) help close the gap. But it’s the new Director’s View mode that caught our eye this year: you can capture video with both the front and back cameras simultaneously. Vloggers and other content creators will relish the fact that they can record reaction shots of themselves, which they can splice in alongside their main footage. Director’s View is a neat idea that you don’t get on most phones (the iPhone 12 series requires a third-party app to pull this off). The Galaxy S21 series is faster for two reasons: it marks the debut of brand-new chipsets, and the software has been streamlined just a bit, with the ever-evolving OneUI 3.0 interface tied into Android 11. Many people have been turned off by the fact that the S21 series doesn’t include a microSD card slot for expandable storage, and, frankly, we’re with you on that. The inclusion of microSD slots always made it easier for us to recommend Samsung over Apple when things were neck-and-neck, as you could go for the lower storage size and upgrade later. You’ll need to have an idea of how much space you need in advance of buying the S21 Ultra – and that’s something that Samsung fans rarely have to think about, as microSD cards were always a nice fallback plan. Samsung’s backend software will automatically adjust between 11Hz and 120Hz, depending on your activity: reading an eBook (low) vs playing a 3D game (high).
You won’t get a charger with the Galaxy S21, and Samsung is betting that you have an old one on hand, or that you’ll buy one at a newly discounted price. The company told TechRadar that 25W has been optimized enough to the point that 45W matters very little, although we’d also suspect few people went out and bought the special 45W charger. Two telephoto lenses are the big highlight with the S21 Ultra, and the 100x zoom will impress your friends, even if the standard image quality only ties the iPhone 12 Pro Max. The Samsung Galaxy S21 delivers some phenomenally good performance, and if you need a smartphone that can handle multiple tasks at once in split-screen view, or when gaming, this will likely be it. But if you can’t afford it, wait a few months and this phone will drop in price (during Amazon Prime Day or Black Friday). Some features, like Bluetooth shortcuts and a spot to embed it in the body of the phone, remain exclusive to the Note 20 Ultra.
Samsung’s newer version of the S21 Ultra has pretty similar specs but one massive change: the S Pen stylus fits within the body, making it a core part of the experience.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra Specs
Specifications are top-notch including Snapdragon 888 chipset, 5G capability, up to 16gigs of RAM, and 512GB of storage.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra review: Ultra refined
The lack of microSD card expansion and a charging brick may frustrate longtime fans, but Samsung has delivered a great all-rounder phone with a clean design, wonderful display, blazing-fast performance, and one of the most versatile camera systems you can get in a smartphone today. If you are looking for an alternative device, check out our list of the The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra is now unavailable to buy from most retailers.
Despite its massive spec sheet, the most ultra part of the phone — the camera — didn’t work nearly as well as intended. The huge 108MP main camera sensor had serious focus issues, the 100x Space Zoom was nearly unusable, and to make matters worse, its bulky 5,000mAh battery didn’t last as long as people had hoped.
The successor to the Galaxy S20 Ultra uses a brand new 108MP sensor aided by a laser-guided focus system, adds an additional 10x optical telephoto sensor, and utilizes a dynamic AMOLED display that can scale down to just 10Hz for better battery life. The camera bump on the S21 Ultra feels purposeful and intentional, even if we’re likely to see plenty of memes comparing it to Cyborg from DC Comics.
Samsung has opted for a matte-textured design for the Galaxy S21 Ultra, which is far less of a fingerprint magnet compared to its glossy predecessor. This is a massive improvement because glossy black on technology tends to make it look and feel cheap. The right side of the phone houses the power button and volume rockers, with two microphone holes up top. The body and display of the Galaxy S21 Ultra are both made of Corning’s latest Gorilla Glass Victus.
As mentioned before, this is a WQHD+ dynamic AMOLED display, with a resolution of 3,200 x 1440, though it should be noted that Samsung sets the phone to FHD+ out of the box. This display can dynamically adjust its refresh rate depending on the kind of content you’re viewing on the phone.
The curve isn’t too extreme though, and the device was still easy to hold, without the issue of ghost touches on the sides like I got with the OnePlus 8 Pro. Hopefully, we’ll soon start seeing under-display selfie cameras like the one in the ZTE Axon 20 5G transition to the mainstream.
This is Qualcomm’s second-generation ultrasonic fingerprint sensor, and it’s far superior to the first generation one we’ve seen since the Samsung Galaxy S10. Personally, I think matte textures are far better than glossy in nearly every circumstance, and the new camera bump looks classy.
Performance The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra was the first device in the United States to feature the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 mobile platform, and as expected, this phone absolutely flies. The global model of this device will launch with Samsung’s own Exynos 2100 chipset, but for the purpose of this review, I’ll be focusing on the Snapdragon 888-powered US variant.
In daily use, I saw no slowdowns or stuttering on this device, and it chewed through effectively every task I threw at it with ease. No apps felt sluggish or were kicked out of memory, likely due to the blisteringly fast Snapdragon 888 processor and substantial 16GB of RAM packed into my unit.
As you can see in the chart above, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra smoked in Gary Sims’ Speed Test G. CPU, mixed, and GPU independently received some of the best scores we’ve tested, with only the GPU falling behind the ASUS ROG Phone 3. However, deeper testing did reveal that the Exynos can’t sustain its peak performance quite as well as the Snapdragon model, which might be a concern for heavy gaming sessions that last more than 30 minutes. In benchmarks, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra performed about as well as you’d expect from Qualcomm’s latest chipset. This modem has the ability to connect to low-band, mid-band, and mmWave 5G networks, and my review unit was packed with a Verizon SIM card to fully test these speeds.
I won’t wax poetic about what this protocol is, but expect better speeds and bandwidth allocation on these networks. The baseline storage of most phones has finally moved up to 128GB, with even the $349 Google Pixel 4a featuring this capacity. Unfortunately, Samsung has removed microSD card expansion from the entire Galaxy S21 line of devices. But now, Samsung is joining the leagues of other manufacturers offering no headphone jack and no microSD card expansion.
This is a larger battery than you’ll find in most devices, though it is still bested by the 6,000mAh cell in the ASUS ROG Phone 3. Still, the dynamic refresh rate and out-of-the-box FHD+ resolution setting afforded the Galaxy S21 Ultra some pretty impressive battery life. This comes on the heels of Apple and Xiaomi scrapping the charger from their packaging, primarily citing environmental reasons. This is an interesting shift from when Samsung sold an optional 45W charger for the Galaxy S20 Ultra. That said, the 45W charger was found to have only a minor effect on overall charging speed, which is likely why Samsung pulled support for it.
This is a bummer, as brands like OnePlus, Huawei, OPPO, and Xiaomi have been pushing charging speeds to 30W, 60W, and even 120W in recent years. I’d hoped that Samsung would eventually start playing catch-up, but I anticipate removing the charger from the box will kill or severely stunt the race for the fastest-charging smartphone. The latter can be useful if you have a smartwatch or a pair of truly wireless earbuds that need a quick jump, but if you’re charging up another phone, heat loss will probably make the power transfer harder to justify, at least in my experience.
The main 108MP sensor had major focusing issues, the 4x optical telephoto camera wasn’t quite as long as many competing flagships, and the 100x Space Zoom that Samsung printed on the camera module itself was barely usable. The color coming out of Samsung sensors seems to have gotten much better since the Galaxy Note 20 series, with slightly more muted, natural tones and less overt saturation. That said, Samsung phones do tend to overexpose just a bit straight out of the camera, and that remained true here. The large main sensor also creates a nice amount of natural bokeh, and generally, I didn’t feel a strong need to use portrait mode. You can still get a little bit of smearing if you don’t hold your hands quite still enough, but in general, the low light of this phone is stellar. The 10x optical camera also dramatically improves more extreme zoom compared to the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.
To make taking images at longer focal lengths easier, Samsung has implemented a shake-reduction system at zooms past 30x. This will bring up a picture-in-picture-style image with a crosshair to help you aim, and once it notices you trying to be stable, it will turn yellow and kick in the shake reduction.
This works as a sort of warp stabilizer and is incredibly useful when trying to stay focused on a tight area of an image.
Portrait mode photos generally looked good and had great edge detection due to that laser-guided autofocus sensor, but it’s still not perfect.
The system can get confused if there is a lot of detail behind a subject, and I’m hoping this improves over time, if not totally replaced by larger portrait-length sensors, which would create a natural depth of field. The quality generally looked pretty stellar, but I did notice some oversharpening and artifacts whenever there were too many hard edges in a scene.
Basically, you press the record button, and Single Take will make a variety of media from that clip. It can also show a feed from the selfie camera in the top corner, which allows you to have multiple different viewpoints in one clip. The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra has one of the best camera suites we’ve ever seen on an Android phone. It’s incredibly versatile, with optical telephoto cameras reaching from .6x to 10x, and the up to 100x space zoom really makes it a telescope in your pocket.
It essentially gives you SLR-like control over the ISO, aperture, and shutter speed on your phone. If you want to check out all the images in their full resolution, as well as even more samples, you can find them in the Google Drive folder here.
One UI 3.0 brought a number of new features, like support for bubble notifications, quick access to widgets, more precise volume control, and the introduction of Samsung Free. The company has managed to cement a specific style in its interface ever since the introduction of One UI with the Galaxy S10 series, and it remains instantly recognizable.
It brings One UI 4 into the mix, along with a slate of new customization options reminiscent of Google’s Material You. The Galaxy S21 Ultra’s biggest competition comes from the top phones in the iPhone 13 series.
With the 128GB iPhone 13 Pro Max starting at $1,099, Samsung and Apple are competing on a very tight margin with their respective ultra-premium flagships. It comes with the largest display at 6.8-inches, the biggest battery at 5,000mAh, and the best camera setup with a primary 108MP sensor.
Compared to other ultra-premium Android phones, the Galaxy S21 Ultra has the newer Snapdragon 888 processor which gave it a huge advantage at launch. They incorporate plenty of Samsung’s components, though both phones run on the first-ever Google Tensor chip. They pack updated 50MP main cameras as well, with Google’s impressive image processing abilities.
That means you’ll find a boxier design with flat edges on the top and bottom, as well as built-in S Pen support. The latest Galaxy flagship is no less expensive at $1,199, but it does offer an upgraded Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor. There have been plenty of phones launched with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 888, but the Galaxy S21 Ultra was one of the first you can get in the United States and still one of the best.
In addition, if you want 10x optical telephoto zoom, you’re left between the S21 Ultra or the HUAWEI P40 Pro Plus — and only one of those is easy to buy and has full access to Google services. The Galaxy S21 Ultra is a killer combo of great design, blazing-fast performance, a wonderful display, long-lasting battery life, and one of the most versatile camera systems you can get in a smartphone today.
Interestingly, Samsung seems to be pushing customers towards the S21 Ultra with its latest Galaxy S series evolution. It has a great design, a wonderful display, battery life that should last almost anyone a full day, and possibly the most versatile camera system you can get in a smartphone today. If microSD card expansion, a headphone jack, or super-fast charging are important to you, sadly you’ll have to look elsewhere.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra review: the real deal
Samsung’s “Ultra” phones are meant to be the absolute pinnacle of the company’s (non-folding) mobile technology. It’s also a perfect example of how Samsung often whiffs on its first attempt at something but presses on anyway, eventually achieving the original vision it couldn’t the first time. 8.5 Verge Score Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G $ 1199.99 The Good Excellent camera system If you are keeping score — and you know that Samsung is — the S21 Ultra’s screen spec is 0.1 inches bigger than the 6.7-inch iPhone 12 Pro Max. Samsung’s main design change was to blend the metal rails on the sides into the camera array on the back. As you may have heard, Samsung is proud of its new, matted “phantom black” finish on the Gorilla Victus Glass on the back of the phone.
We have already put a tiny scratch on ours that shows through as silver simply by setting the phone down on concrete to take a photo of it. Funny story: usually when Samsung introduces a new flagship phone, its reps will talk my ear off about the technology and quality of its new, big screen.
This year, the company simply pointed out that it supports an adaptive refresh rate up to 120Hz at its native 3200 x 1440 resolution and left it at that.
But we started counting exactly how many times you have to hit “agree” to use devices when we review them since these are agreements most people don’t read and definitely can’t negotiate. Samsung’s “Eye Comfort” setting for turning down blue light at night is still a little ham-fisted compared to the iPhone, but that’s my only real complaint. Samsung says it is utilizing the extra features in this chip to improve image processing and add the variable refresh rate (which runs from 10Hz up to 120Hz) at full resolution.
For my testing, I turned on every bell and whistle: max resolution, adaptive refresh rate, high brightness, always-on screen. Even when shooting a ton of photos, 4K and 8K video, and playing games, the 5,000mAh battery lasted through the next morning consistently.
Perhaps it was inevitable as a cost-cutting measure (along with nixing the AC adapter and MST payment tech that worked with standard credit card readers), but it’s a bummer nonetheless. Later this year, Samsung will sell an S Pen Pro that adds in Bluetooth so you can use it as a remote for you phone if you like. I didn’t get the S Pen to test so I can’t speak to whether it’s any good, but I don’t have any reason to expect it would be too different from the stylus experience on the Note line of phones. But of all the specs I’ve listed — both good and disappointing — the one that had the biggest tangible effect on my experience was the new in-screen fingerprint sensor from Qualcomm. It’s both bigger and faster, and it means I can just quickly tap to unlock the phone without needing to aim that carefully. Because we unlock our phones so often, even tiny changes make a huge difference in reducing a sense of friction.
To justify its price and size, the Galaxy S21 Ultra needed to overcome years of stasis and finally bring Samsung up to par with the competition.
The camera system on the Galaxy S21 Ultra is the best I’ve used on any Android phone and is extremely competitive with the iPhone 12 Pro Max. Night mode Surprisingly, the S21 Ultra’s focal plane doesn’t seem as narrow as the S21, allowing more of close subjects to stay in focus. I am happy to report that nearly every problem I had with the original Galaxy S20 Ultra’s camera system has been resolved.
Focusing is fast and accurate, the focal plane seems bigger, there’s no discernible shutter lag, and most of all: the pictures look better. Proper optical zoom at 3X makes a big difference, and Samsung uses data from multiple lenses up to 10X. Samsung still has its gimmicky “Space Zoom” that works up to 100X, but I couldn’t get anything usable beyond 30X and even then it required a lot of light to create something passable.
The Galaxy S21 Ultra left, iPhone 12 Pro Max right; Approx 10x zoom on each.
The S21 Ultra does a very good job with dynamic range and adjusting exposure on the fly as you pan the camera through a scene. Both the S21 Ultra and the iPhone 12 Pro Max have switched to physically larger sensors and it has revealed the limits of computational photography. And it also has compensated for the relative dearth of high-quality third-party Android photo apps by building in its own features. Samsung’s One UI interface is still good for big screens, but there are just so many options in quick settings, many of which mean nothing to the average person. Tap it and the next biggest thing you’re likely to see is the kind of ad that’s normally at the bottom of a crappy, overloaded website.
If the Galaxy S21 Ultra has a downfall, it’s in how Samsung’s version of Android has become messy and displays ads in some apps
Bixby, Samsung’s digital assistant, is still the default, and it’s difficult to switch away from it (you need third-party software). I know Samsung isn’t to blame for RCS’s problems, but as the biggest Android seller in the US, you’d like to think the company would try to fix this.
Dodge or disable all those ads and install all the non-Samsung versions of software, and it’s a powerful and sometimes elegant experience. The biggest reality check is the software, which suffers from Samsung’s heavy-handed attempts to build its own ecosystem and further monetize an already expensive phone. If you can navigate the software, the size, and the price tag, the Galaxy S21 Ultra is the best Android phone available today.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) Display review: Near-twin of Exynos version
The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) has been selling in the U.S. and China (and a few other places) since January 2021 and is the near-identical twin of the S21 Ultra (Exynos) version sold in other parts of the world. Both share the same high-end specs, including the same quad-camera setup and stylus support; the only difference in hardware between the two versions is in the processors they use: the U.S./China-oriented model relies on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 chipset, while Samsung uses its own Exynos 2100 in the model sold elsewhere. Because of their close similarities in performance, this review will mostly focus on the very few differences between the two versions in our comprehensive Display protocol testing. (For more complete performance results, please refer to our Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos) review.) AMOLED 2x screen with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus About DXOMARK Display tests: For scoring and analysis in our smartphone and other display reviews, DXOMARK engineers perform a variety of objective and perceptual tests under controlled lab and real-life conditions.
This article highlights the most important results of our testing. Note that we evaluate display attributes using only the device’s built-in display hardware and its still image (gallery) and video apps at their default settings.
(For in-depth information about how we evaluate smartphone and other displays, check out our articles, “How DXOMARK tests display quality” and “A closer look at DXOMARK Display testing.”)
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 131 display Readability 150 162 Google Pixel 8 Pro Best: Google Pixel 8 Pro (162) Color 128 164 Google Pixel 8 Pro Best: Google Pixel 8 Pro (164) Video 159 162 Samsung Galaxy S23 (Snapdragon) Best: Samsung Galaxy S23 (Snapdragon) (162) Motion 118 155 Huawei P40 Pro Best: Huawei P40 Pro (155) Touch 74 168 Samsung Galaxy Z Fold5 Best: Samsung Galaxy Z Fold5 (168) Artifacts 116 161 Xiaomi Mix Fold 2 Best: Xiaomi Mix Fold 2 (161) Please be aware that beyond this point, we have not modified the initial test results. While data and products remain fully comparable, you might encounter mentions and references to the previous scores.
Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Snapdragon) 136 34. Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Exynos) 134 42.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 131 54. Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos) 131 54.
Samsung Galaxy Note20 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 129 65. Samsung Galaxy Note20 Ultra 5G (Exynos) 128 74.
Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (Exynos) 123 101. Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra (Snapdragon) 148 11.
Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Snapdragon) 136 27. Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Exynos) 134 32. Pros Well-balanced brightness and accurate colors lead to a satisfying experience when watching HD10 videos. Well-adapted luminance levels and high maximum brightness mean very good readability in most conditions.
The device has great smoothness when web browsing and in the gallery app. The device manages frame drops well when watching videos. Cons Color faithfulness deteriorates under very bright outdoor conditions, particularly under sunlight.
The device is inaccurate when zooming in the gallery app and does not correctly detect touches along its edges when playing video games. Slightly dazzling in dark ambient conditions, and the BLF does not filter out enough blue light under any lighting condition. With almost entirely identical scores across all attributes, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) joins its Exynos twin in joint first place (as of this writing) in our DXOMARK Display rankings. Readability Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 74 76 Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max Best: Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max (76) Achieving an excellent score of 74, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) is currently in a three-way tie for first with Exynos version and the TCL 10 Pro. It has good readability at its default settings; however, the both S21 Ultra devices are somewhat dazzling in low-light conditions, which may make viewing a bit uncomfortable for some users. Indoors, the device’s brightness ensures that most content is easily readable, but darker tones lack detail.
Despite its high luminance outdoors, the S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) lacks readability, especially for darker content. The Snapdragon-powered smartphone adapts smoothly to light transitions but the rendering changes abruptly when moving from sunlight to shade.
The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) loses brightness when viewed in angle. As you can see in the array below, the Exynos version (second from left) is noticeably brighter:
Brightness at a 45° angle, from left to right: Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon), Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos), Apple iPhone 12 Pro, Vivo X51 5G Photo credit: DXOMARK; for illustration only
The objective measurements in the graph above confirm the perceptual results between the two Samsung devices.
Color Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 82 92 Sony Xperia 5 IV Best: Sony Xperia 5 IV (92) The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) shows oversaturated colors along with some slight pink casts on most contents.
In bright sunlight, colors are strongly oversaturated and color nuances disappear, leading to inaccurate rendering: Color rendering in direct sunlight, from left to right: Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon), Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos), Apple iPhone 12 Pro, Vivo X51 5G Photo credit: DXOMARK; for illustration only Video Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 90 91 Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Snapdragon) Best: Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Snapdragon) (91) The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) has the same score as the Exynos version. Both devices offer excellent levels of brightness and color fidelity when watching HDR10 content. As for differences between the two models, as shown in the illustrative photo array below, the Exynos version’s rendering is just slightly more vivid and closer to the reference image rendering than the Snapdragon’s.
Video color, from left to right: Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon), Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos), Apple iPhone 12 Pro, Vivo X51 5G Photo credit: DXOMARK; for illustration only At 77 points apiece, both versions of the S21 Ultra 5G trail behind the class-leading Huawei P40 Pro at 87, with both showing some frame duplications and regular stuttering while playing video games, along with some hesitation in playback reactivity when rewinding or fast-forwarding videos.
The Samsung devices’ lackluster results for motion are far overshadowed by their disappointing performance for touch, as both showed inaccuracies when using with fingers (though good with the S Pen stylus). Further, although they were very smooth in the gallery app and when web browsing, there was a perceptible lack of fluidity when gaming.
Artifacts Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) 79 86 Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max Best: Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max (86) Artifacts is the only category in which the two S21 Ultra 5G models earned different scores, with the Snapdragon version bettering the Exynos by one point.
Both devices have problems with ghost touches in landscape mode, and noticeable flicker in dark ambient viewing conditions. Flicker comparison This graph represents the frequencies of lighting variation; the highest peak gives the main flicker frequency.
That all said, the Snapdragon version of the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G handles aliasing somewhat better than its Exynos twin, although neither device’s rendering would win it any plaudits from the gaming community:
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon), aliasing closeup Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos), aliasing closeup
The Snapdragon and Exynos versions of the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G are very similar, though the Snapdragon shows slightly better performance in handling artifacts. Overall, both show the same strengths and weaknesses: because of touch performance and aliasing, for example, neither model would be the first choice for serious gamers, but otherwise these latest Samsung twins come with a great display, especially for watching videos.
(For more complete performance results, see our Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos) review.)
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