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The artificial intelligence (AI) theme isn’t writing itself, at this point. Someone’s doing the writing, and as far as what Samsung has written for smartphones is concerned, it’s the navigation most others are relying on. Circle to Search was the biggest pitch Galaxy AI made, this time last year. Albeit alongside, a lot more. This year, with limited scope of a similar exclusivity period, the focus is on refinement. Turns out, that’s a theme successfully dominating new Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra’s hardware, upgrades and overall personality too. In my book, it is resoundingly ticking off the proverbial flagship checklist.
For a moment, we must pause to take stock of the price tags in play, if you wish to splurge on the Galaxy S25 Ultra. There is a 12GB RAM and 256GB storage variant that’s priced at ₹1,29,999 but for now, Samsung is automatically upgrading those orders to the 12GB+512GB spec — that is a saving of ₹12,000, and there’s definite value there. The top tier spec with 1TB storage has a sticker price of ₹1,65,999. The base spec pricing doesn’t change from its predecessor, the Galaxy S24 Ultra, but other specs do bear some generational inflation. The competition landscape includes the recent flagships, the Vivo X200 Pro, Google Pixel 9 Pro XL and the OnePlus 13.
I’ll get to the other changes in a bit, because it is important to talk about what leads the generational change—refinements to Galaxy AI. Some of these are visible as new features you’d interface with, such as the Now Brief. Others, less prominent but improves utility, such as quick access via the Edge Panel, accessing Gemini with the power key and better grasp of the natural language.
Now Brief in particular is quite useful, once it has a full context of your life. Periodical refresh means you get a different set of guidance in the morning, afternoon, evening and before hitting the bed (this is a particularly useful gamut of sports scores and a glimpse of the day ahead). Weather remains a constant, with dynamic elements including your meetings sourced from the calendar, news and sports scores. In my case, I never saw any traffic guidance based on my time of travel. Only once did I see the sports score element in the notification bar not update, though the Now Brief page remained up to date.
It was about time to give Bixby a rest, and by mapping Gemini to the power key, Samsung’s further refined the AI you’ll interface with on the Galaxy S25 Ultra, and key to that is the natural language support thats across the phone. Gallery uses AI for better search using subject-driven phrases, and the editing features remain a detailed delight to use. In my observation, voice recorder transcriptions have imbibed more accuracy with different accents too. All in all, a comprehensive step forward.
Never in the history of the Samsung Galaxy S Ultra, has there ever been any shortage of performance. The Galaxy S25 Ultra being pleasantly no different. The beating heart is the 3-nanometer Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, and just for good measure, this continues the “for Galaxy” tradition which means customisations exactly as Samsung wanted for their flagship. It isn’t often that Qualcomm does this, but then again, Samsung’s is a special case. Key here, the custom core designs Qualcomm has made for the performance and prime cores.
With 12GB RAM, you’d not find this stuttering even the slightest. The bigger takeaway is, the Galaxy S25 Ultra manages to stay rather cool too even with the typical tasks (navigation, camera usage and often, editing videos) have long led to flagship phones facing the heat. Quite literally. By managing to stay cooler, the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s sustained performance is significantly better than most Android flagships of the generation gone by. That is a significant improvement, and particularly good for battery life.
Speaking of which, you’ll now find the battery stamina isin the ballpark of 10 hours screen on time. That is at least an hour and a half more than the predecessor, and in the same range as the latest OnePlus 13 (albeit that has a bigger 6,000 mAh battery compared to the 5,000 mAh battery here). Significant improvements, and real-world versatility on show. The limitations (at least in the perspective of the times we live in) include a wired charging speed that is capped at 45-watt and the lack of magnets for this “Qi2 ready” wireless charging that’ll limit accessories it can work with.
I wouldn’t complicate things by referencing generational benchmark changes (the Galaxy S25 Ultra is faster, is all that needs to be said), but a good reason why there is an additional sprightliness to the interface are the changes made to One UI 7. Animations are refined and optimised. That is in addition to other very noticeable interface changes which make things better. Splitting the notification list and quick toggles for settings may be a change legacy Samsung users would have to get used to.
That said, the S Pen no longer has Bluetooth connectivity, and that has meant the removal of a power source and the gyro sensor. It is still as you’d expect for drawing, writing or scribbling, but the utility overall has been somewhat curtailed.
There is some continuity in terms of the 200-megapixel primary wide cameras and the 50-megapixel telephoto with 5x optical zoom. The change in this troika is the 50-megapixel ultra wide sensor, up from 12-megapixel that the Galaxy S24 Ultra used. It is a change that is well appreciated, because it gives parity of versatility for landscape shots too. Having used the predecessor as well, the different tonality of image processing is quire clear with the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s photos.
The main camera, in the default 12-megapixel pixel-binned mode as well as the 50-megapixel mode, takes appreciably detailed photos with well separated colours and good illumination across. One could argue that the dynamic range is slightly compromised by an algorithm that’s leaning towards brighter shots, but there is enough scope to edit it just right, if the finer details bother you. Zoom in and you’ll notice a faint layer of graininess with daylight photos. I wouldn’t at all categorise this as a drawback, but more in the sense that a smartphone camera after so many years, finally adds a unique character to its photos.
Samsung Galaxy flagships and long zoom lengths remain a regular fixture, and this works well for handheld shots till 10x. Very usable photos, and as you get close to 10x, the utility of the image processing begins to show. Any more, and you’ll necessarily need to stabilise the Galaxy S25 Ultra before expelling ant usable photos.
Video enhancements go much beyond the already impressive specs — great 4K videos, impressive colours and dynamic range, as well as the audio layer that comes through brilliantly even without a mic. The big change however, in my book, is the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s ability to smoothly transition between zoom levels while recording. A definitive improvement from the slight judder that was apparent previously.
Samsung has quite literally sharpened the edges with the Galaxy S25 Ultra. The design too, sees a much bigger overhaul than the previous few generations brought along. The 6.9-inch OLED display gains a bit of real estate, compared with 6.8-inches of the Galaxy S24 Ultra. Samsung continues to bet on the HDR10+ high dynamic range (HDR) standard, which perhaps is why a no-show of Dolby Vision, was to be expected. There was a time when Samsung used to lead the brightness (measured in nits) race by a long margin. While that is no longer the case (the Vivo X200 Pro, Google Pixel 9 Pro XL and the OnePlus 13 have caught up), this OLED panel is getting just everything right — be it for reading, watching videos, editing photos or gaming.
The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra is flawless, or at least is very close to achieving that, which isn’t always the case with Android phones. The OnePlus 13 is brilliant otherwise, but the camera still needs work. The Vivo X200 Pro perhaps sets the photography benchmark, but broader software needs refinement. The Google Pixel 9 Pro XL is almost doing everything well, but lacks a definitive factor to draw value to its price tag. The Galaxy S25 Ultra is an all-rounder, where its competition is still searching for a few remaining skills.
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