The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra Smooths Out Some Sharp Edges

The Galaxy S25 Ultra, announced today, sheds overmuch of its Note roots this twelvemonth pinch rounded corners and level edges that align it overmuch pinch nan remainder of nan S series. It comes pinch Qualcomm’s latest chipset, an upgraded ultrawide camera, and not overmuch else, hardware-wise. With nary worth summation complete past year’s exemplary — starting astatine $1,299 — it’s a ray refresh of Samsung’s biggest phone, pinch a awesome accent connected One UI 7.0’s AI upgrades.

Something astir nan displacement from curved edges to level sides makes nan S25 Ultra look hefty successful photos, for illustration if nan Cybertruck were a phone. But it’s really somewhat smaller and lighter than past year’s device, moreover pinch a bigger 6.9-inch aboveground acknowledgment to slimmer bezels. It’s equipped pinch a Snapdragon 8 Elite processor tuned for Galaxy devices — that’s existent for each S25-series phones sold successful each regions, which hasn’t been nan suit recently. And it still comes pinch 1 overmuch beardown spec: 7 years of OS updates and accusation patches.

There are immoderate absorbing things not connected nan Ultra this year, though. Bixby is nary longer nan default virtual assistant. It’s still coming and you tin summon it done its ain app. But Google Gemini will reply erstwhile you long-press nan aftermath fastener connected nan broadside of nan phone.

The included S Pen, different holdover from nan Note era, gets a spot of a downgrade. It nary longer supports Bluetooth, truthful nan aerial mobility controls that erstwhile versions offered are gone. The S25 Ultra’s included S Pen is conscionable a basal stylus, nary magic wand tricks up its sleeve. Bummer.

Camera hardware is mostly unchanged from nan erstwhile model, isolated from for a caller 50-megapixel ultrawide, replacing a 12-megapixel module. Samsung claims that an upgrade to nan S25’s algorithmic image processing has improved point successful zoomed images. On nan video side, Samsung now offers a Galaxy Log level scheme connected pinch a civilization LUT.

The astir absorbing changes are software-side successful One UI 7.0. My workfellow Dominic Preston has a bully rundown of nan caller worldly arsenic it too appears connected nan S25 and S25 Plus models. Unsurprisingly, it each has to do pinch AI, and overmuch of it we were already acquainted pinch acknowledgment to nan One UI 7.0 beta. But a mates of things made maine beryllium up and net attention.

The first is nan expertise to usage AI crossed apps to return action, for illustration taking a image of a flyer and having Gemini adhd nan dates to your almanac and nonstop your spouse an email astir it. Maybe this doesn’t sound for illustration much, but immoderate of america personification to retrieve which clip is “crazy hairsbreadth day” astatine preschool, erstwhile conferences are, and nan deadline for signing up for this season’s changeable class. A mini thief would beryllium nice. This will first activity crossed Google Workspace and Samsung autochthonal apps, pinch nan summation of WhatsApp and Spotify.

The different constituent I’m consenting to spot successful action is suggested routines. In theory, nan S25 phones will beryllium tin to announcement if location are definite settings you bladed to usage astatine nan aforesaid clip each clip aliases nether definite conditions — for illustration turning Bluetooth connected each clip you get successful nan car and turning it disconnected erstwhile you get out. When it sees a pattern, it should beryllium tin to propose a regular to return attraction of those actions for you automatically. You’ll beryllium tin to customize nan regular parameters to your liking, but you won’t personification to spell done nan tedious activity of mounting it up from scratch. That could beryllium cool!

The constituent is, this worldly isn’t exclusive to nan S25 Ultra aliases moreover nan S25 series. Samsung smartphone merchandise caput Blake Gaiser told maine Samsung will bring its caller AI features to older devices wherever possible. The institution surely seems committed to delivering those updates to older phones — but don’t hide that they astir apt won’t ever beryllium free.

We’ll find retired soon tin whether this is nan AI update that will yet coming connected nan committedness of AI connected our smartphones; nan Galaxy S25 Ultra and its S25 siblings alloy connected February 7th.