Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra Review

         Review of Samsung Galaxy Note20 Ultra

 But the one thing I’m most excited for is the Note 20 Ultra’s 108-megapixel camera. This is the same image sensor on the S20 Ultra,s with one important change: a laser sensor that enables faster autofocusing. In other words: Samsung says it has fixed the S20 ultra autofocusing issue on the Note 20 Ultra. I’ll test that out soon enough to verify the claim, but for now, here’s everything else you need to know about the Note 20 phones.

It's a big phone!Input

Under normal circumstances, this would be a hands-on. I’d be telling you how the Note 20 and 20 Ultra compare; how well they feel; if the S Pen features are any good; and how good the cameras are. But since we’re still in a pandemic, I haven’t had an opportunity to try it myself. My colleague Evan got to take some photos with the pre-production devices that you see in this story, but Samsung says the hardware and software may not be complete.

The good news is that you already know what to expect from the S20Ultra if you’ve held any glass-and-metal phone before. The Note 20 is weirder since it's plastic; the last time a Note was plastic was Galaxy Note 4. The bad news is you need to wait until I get the Note 20 Ultra in my hands before I can tell you if something isn’t right. Samsung did tell me one thing: the glass back is supposed to have a “haze effect” that reduces fingerprints.

Let’s not waste any more time and get to phone bits.

GALAXY NOTE 20 — It’s wider, taller, and thicker than the Note 10. The Note 20 comes in three colors: Mystic Bronze, Mystic Green, and Mystic Gray. It starts at $999.

• 6.7-inch flat FHD+ display (2,400 x 1,080)
• Qualcomm Snapdragon 865+
• 8GB of RAM
• 128GB of storage
• 4,300 mAh battery
• 5G
• 12-megapixel f/1.8 main camera with “super speed dual pixel AF” and optical image stabilization
• 12-megapixel f/2.2 ultra-wide camera
• 64-megapixel f/2.0 telephoto camera with 3x hybrid optical zoom and 30x space zoom, OIS
• 10-megapixel f/2.2 selfie camera

The S Pen has lower latency now.Input

GALAXY NOTE 20 ULTRA — Also larger, but only slightly in height and thickness compared to the Note 10+. The Note 20 Ultra comes in Mystic Black, Mystic Bronze, and Mystic White. It starts at $1,299 for the 128GB model; the 512GB model only comes in black.

• 6.9-inch curved Quad HD+ display (3,088 x 1,440)
• Qualcomm Snapdragon 865+
• 8GB or 12GB of RAM
• 128GB or 512GB of storage (expandable to 1TB via microSD)
• 4,500 mAh battery
• 5G
• 108-megapixel f/1.8 main camera with “phase-detection autofocus” and optical image stabilization
• 8K video recording at 24 fps in 21:9 aspect ratio
• 12-megapixel f/2.2 ultra-wide camera
• 12-megapixel f/3.0 telephoto camera with 5x optical zoom and 50x space zoom, OIS
• Laser autofocus sensor
• 10-megapixel f/2.2 selfie camera

So both phones are very similar. All of the usual staples like IP68 water- and dust-resistance, fast wired and wireless charging, Wireless PowerShare, Dolby Atmos support, HDR10+, are present and accounted for. Both phones also run Android 10 (no word on when Android 11 will arrive). Samsung is usually slow to push out software updates.

The Note 20 Ultra (left) and the Note 20 (right)

NEW S PEN TRICKS — Hardware differences aside, Samsung says it’s made several improvements to the S Pen on both Note 20 and 20 Ultra. Latency has been reduced by 40 percent with 26ms response time on the Note 20; the S Pen on the Note 20 Ultra is even faster with a 9ms response time.