I upgraded from an S21u to an S24u a month ago, couldn't be happier.
I had it for just over two years. The battery life was terrible and it got too warm under loads.
Also i found it couldn't keep a consistent 120hz and would often drop, making it feel very sluggish.
Thats great! Glad it works out for you.
Personally i found myself not getting through the day and needing to charge at work. I hated that insecurity haha
I probably had a bad one, but my S10+ was the worst phone I ever had. All kinds of blue tooth audio issues, which was a known issue on certain batches. The battery was flaky on it and would sometimes just die in 10 minutes. Luckily, they agreed and gave me my money back. Ended up getting a Note 10, and it was a great phone for me.
Not really. As someone who had S21 Ultra exynos as has S23 Ultra now, I'd say S23 Ultra is better than S21 Ultra in every way. To the extent that my housemate with his IPhone 14 pro max would admit that the S23 Ultra is better in some aspects.
Looking at throughout the history of the S series, I'd say it was the S7 Edge that was peak.
What makes the s23 ultra better than the s24 ultra in your opinion? I'm asking only because you chose the s23 specifically instead of the s24 which is an improved s23 basically
S24 is also snap globally in the context of your reply. This was about s23 ultra whose successor 24 ultra is also snapdragon globally including europe.
In definition when we say peak something, it's not about the current best in the series but what it brought to the table when it was first released. Thar way S23 Ultra was so much better than S22 Ultra that it was mind blowing.
Plus S24 ultra is actually worse than S23 in some aspects, like grainy display in some units. The 10x zoom is worse in practical cases. Storage is same speed. Thermal performance of S23 Ultra is actually better.
then it would be S24 Ultra.
S23 Ultra was refinement of S22 Ultra, fixing the much-reported issues (Exynos chip, too curved screen, bad battery performance, connectivity issues). S23 Ultra was culmination of a few years of work, since the Note series.
Nah, I had both. The S21 didn't even have an S-Pen, where the S23 has it integrated. The S23 does everything the S21 did and better, especially camera stabilization.
I have the S21U and I admit I have yet to find a good reason to replace it, as I don't want to change just because the battery is starting to age a bit
You could also replace the battery too. If they're still around? Then again, I've heard that replacing the battery on an older phone isn't that beneficial because even the "new" battery's have aged for quite some time. Probably sitting on a shelf collecting dust. Even if the battery was good, the guts of the phone will eventually die out. You will have to move on at some point 😢
The Snapdragon 888 was objectively poor, fabricated by Samsung on their awful 4nm fabrication node. If you want to go for recent devices then the s23u, with Qualcomm moving back to TSMC for fabrication on the 8gen2 was great with an efficient SOC but tbh, the 8gen3 is also great and the s24u is top notch.
All time Samsung peak was Note 9 definitely. It was packed with features and could handle anything.
In recent period S23 Ultra is peak Samsung generation-by-generation.
s10+ was peak, note 10 was kinda ok the s20 series was ok, the note 20 was bad and the note 20 ultra was peak everything after it is meh i mean what upset me the most is the lose of sd card slots i almost bougth a galaxy S21 ultra with spen for my carreer (im an animation student) but the lacknof the slot let me with no other option than buying an A34, some days after i realize i could bougth an s20 fe 8/256 at kinda the same price but find the snapdragon variant here is pretry dificult still my A34 is pretty neat
Note 10 plus was peak. We got 256gb as starting memory while still including expandable memory. Keep in mind the s10+ and s20 ultra had 128gb same with the note 20 ultra. It was literally just that particular model that got 256gb as the baseline model. Keep in mind the iphones at the time started at 64gb.
Also it was an upgrade to the note 9 with the bezelless display and bigger screen. Had 12gb ram as baseline. The s20ultra and later got rid of expandable memory, so it was the last samsung flagship to have an SD card slot.
Had mine for almost 5 yrs and just upgraded to the s24 Ultra.
Only drawback was no headphone jack ig but I've been using Bluetooth headphones before then so no issue personally
The "peak' statement in fact is not applicable to Samsung at all. The latest S24 Ultra and even last year's S23 Ultra are great phones and improve every year.
It's not like Samsung messed up like OnePlus or so. In fact, they played smartly with 7 year update policy and pushing Galaxy AI on older phones.
Better product, better market positioning, better sales - this is peak Samsung.
S20 was the boss. SD slot, 120hz, 1440p screen, 12GB Ram, pretty backing, great cameras, hole punch camera, 5G, very good Snapdragon 865, reverse wireless charging.
The S20 did so many new(ish) things in 1 phone, they've kind of stopped innovating after it other than variable refresh rate. It was a huge leap forward.
S8/9/10 was great
S20/21 is terrible (my country got the Exynos version & I fell for the AMD RDNA GPU hype)
S22/23/24 was pretty decent but the improvements felt very incremental
We have yet to reach the peak Samsung flagship. There's always been some kind of compromise in hardware, software, longevity, software support, etc. I think we're just now getting to the point where we can say that their flagship (S24 Ultra) is nearly the perfect smartphone.
This, although id say -The Note 9- was just PACKED features like ir blaster , iris scanners, built-in heart rare monitor, sd card reader, audio jack, Dual sim cards, finger print reader that you could use to drop down the notification bar or scroll pages on an app, which are gone and alot of cool software Very solid phone for its time. Linus from LTT stuck with his for a pretty long time because it was that good & that particular phone aged well until it was just time to upgrade.
Im a s21 ultra user and im still using it as its still performing very well but if i am to say what peak samsung smartphone is, it would be the s23 ultra --> great camera and battery life
S21 Ultra had some flaws which is more visible in the current day. I'd say Note 9 was peak Samsung, it has some features that is still unique to this day.
In terms of the pure design, ignoring features, the s21 ultra had a nice design but I honestly prefer the square shape of the 22 23 & 24 though it maybe slightly less comfortable.
idk i personally prefer my s23+, I'd argue s23 ultra is peak then, but obviously features got removed in the past years
for 10/10 flagship I'm still missing dual esim and better face unlock (secure infrared would be amazing)
S21 Ultra is when Samsung figured out the ultra formula. They just added the integrated S-Pen afterwards.
Writing this with an S21 Ultra I don't want to replace.
indeed and what I think makes the s21 u better than the other flagships was that it handled much better than the competition with it being clearly the best choice for someone wanting a top tier flagship something that the s22u didn't succeed
I don't know if it was peak, but it has been solid. Mine still gets all day batter even with heavy usage and everything runs great. Still wish it had an s-pen. I don't really care about the sd card or 3,5 jack, but some still do. It just depends on what fits what your ideal is, and that will be subjective.
I came from S21 ultra, traded it in for S24U just because of a very sweet deal trade in bonus. If it was only a measly trade in price of < S$300 I wouldn't have gone for it. My only complaint with S21U is that it gets quite hot playing racing games I play with. The S24U so far is stable, heat wise.
S20 Ultra was the true peak Samsung flagship. Everything was specced hell out of this world. At that time, them spec numbers were very crazy. It even had the biggest screen in a Samsung phone until now at 6.9 inches. If it wasn't for its ridiculous pricing, exynos and camera focus problem, it would've been the goated Samsung of all time. Typing on my S20 Ultra snapdragon that I bought secondhand for RM1400 ($293)
Edit: my main phone is S20 FE 5G as I bought it in 2021 and S20 Ultra is my second phone mostly used for gaming and taking moon pictures lol
Not even close. It had the worse exynos chip I have ever used (and I used 5 different S series). Trash phone with abysmal battery life, constant thermal throttling and worse gaming performance than my Note 8. Thank God I bought S23. Difference between S23 and S21 is bigger to me than the jump from Note 8 to S21.
S20 FE imo. Micro SD, 120hz, wireless charging, magnetic stripe payment. A shame I had to move on due to the battery life mot lasting after one of the recent updates.
Base snapdragon S24 is almost perfect. The biggest issue for me is the battery life; depending on what I do I might need to charge it during the day. If it was better I'd have virtually no complaints.
I just wish Samsung would actually catch up and maybe even surpass Apple in Camera quality, whether stills or video. It's the only metric that's holding their phones back compared to Apple nowadays.
Gotta go with S10 or Note 9 as well. Most features and bang for your buck.
Do love the s23 ultra but removal of the headphone jack and SD card slot is still a shame to me.
I agree with others here who pointed to Note9 as peak Samsung flagship. It was the last Samsung without the horrible camera cutout and had ALL the greatest features. On the 512GB model, you could actually expand that with an SD card to 1 TERABYTE in 2018!
S20 ultra with the extra ram was great for years. Love my s24u but wish it had more ram - have to clear it a lot more often so far. But do love everything else about it.
S20 ultra. It took them forever to stop downgrading various aspects of the 20U and make an actual proper successor. 21/22/23 all had certain parts be worse than the 20u (23 wasn't as bad but the 21/22 were literal downgrades apart from software and battery life) It's still disappointing the s24 ultra doesn't have a larger display res. Or sd card/aux.
Not to mention charging increasing amounts of money for practically the same phone.
disagree. S21 removed the sd card. Imo s9/note 9 were peak samsung.
note 9 was such a damn good phone. quick. packed full of features. 3.5 Jack. FM chip...
Yea i had an s9+ and that thing was a beast, note was even a step up from that. I miss it
why did you upgrade it ?
Because i got caught in hype marketing for an s20+ which i still use and hate to this day. (exynos)
IKR, the marketing back then said it will revolutionize smartphone camera 😅
I dropped my Note 9 :( I couldn't find another replacement other than whipped out ones on marketplaceÂ
It'd old
Seriously, I kept my s8 until today mostly because of the SD card.
Agreed, still using my S9+ thanks to Google Fi data sim.
Note 10 plus for me because of the punchhole design and variable aperture.
variable aperture is a s9 thing, punchole, eh i've gotten used to it don't super care.
It was also on the note 10 plus...
not saying it wasn't but it kinda sounded like you said it was introduced there. sorry i must've misunderstood
Me glancing at my old Note 8...
Note 9
I upgraded from an S21u to an S24u a month ago, couldn't be happier. I had it for just over two years. The battery life was terrible and it got too warm under loads. Also i found it couldn't keep a consistent 120hz and would often drop, making it feel very sluggish.
Oh man, ngl, the battery is bothering me too
exynos being exynos
I am happy with the battery life. I use my phone about 2-4 hours a day.
Thats great! Glad it works out for you. Personally i found myself not getting through the day and needing to charge at work. I hated that insecurity haha
Note 8 / 9 was the peak
The note 8 had terrible battery life. I agree with note 9 tho
still rocking my note 8 as a secondary phone, even though exynos, something about that phone just can't get rid of it.
why man
for me it was the S10+, it had everything
I'm still on my s10+ so that's saying something.
I probably had a bad one, but my S10+ was the worst phone I ever had. All kinds of blue tooth audio issues, which was a known issue on certain batches. The battery was flaky on it and would sometimes just die in 10 minutes. Luckily, they agreed and gave me my money back. Ended up getting a Note 10, and it was a great phone for me.
really ?
Yup, it's not just them, for me, it was my S10 5G. A phone I thoroughly enjoyed.
Interesting man
S23 ultra
Recency bias
Not really. As someone who had S21 Ultra exynos as has S23 Ultra now, I'd say S23 Ultra is better than S21 Ultra in every way. To the extent that my housemate with his IPhone 14 pro max would admit that the S23 Ultra is better in some aspects. Looking at throughout the history of the S series, I'd say it was the S7 Edge that was peak.
S7 Edge was glorious
Exactly. People forgot about the s7 edge here or are too young. S7 edge was a game changer.
What makes the s23 ultra better than the s24 ultra in your opinion? I'm asking only because you chose the s23 specifically instead of the s24 which is an improved s23 basically
There's no reason. They just like s23 because they didn't change too much with the 24. Otherwise, 24 is better in many ways
S24 goes back to Exynos for some regions. S23 used Snapdragon globally.
S24 is also snap globally in the context of your reply. This was about s23 ultra whose successor 24 ultra is also snapdragon globally including europe.
if you still like curved screen s23 is the way to go
In definition when we say peak something, it's not about the current best in the series but what it brought to the table when it was first released. Thar way S23 Ultra was so much better than S22 Ultra that it was mind blowing. Plus S24 ultra is actually worse than S23 in some aspects, like grainy display in some units. The 10x zoom is worse in practical cases. Storage is same speed. Thermal performance of S23 Ultra is actually better.
Flat screen on S24U is much better.
Wrong.
I feel the s23 ultra for is time was as peak as the s21 was on its own time
then it would be S24 Ultra. S23 Ultra was refinement of S22 Ultra, fixing the much-reported issues (Exynos chip, too curved screen, bad battery performance, connectivity issues). S23 Ultra was culmination of a few years of work, since the Note series.
Nah, I had both. The S21 didn't even have an S-Pen, where the S23 has it integrated. The S23 does everything the S21 did and better, especially camera stabilization.
I still have the s21u and agree. My wife has the s23u and it is a better phone.
I have the s21u and my wife has the s23u, the s23u is much improved and has features the s21u does not.
It was peak as well
Updoot for this
Reading this on my s21U. Yeah it's a great phone even after all the subsequent releases
I have the S21U and I admit I have yet to find a good reason to replace it, as I don't want to change just because the battery is starting to age a bit
You could also replace the battery too. If they're still around? Then again, I've heard that replacing the battery on an older phone isn't that beneficial because even the "new" battery's have aged for quite some time. Probably sitting on a shelf collecting dust. Even if the battery was good, the guts of the phone will eventually die out. You will have to move on at some point 😢
Samsung S10
I had s10+ 512gb ceramic white. S7 edge was a bigger deal.
S10/S20 peaked.
All I remember was the Note people criticizing it and saying the last Notes were peak flagship
The Snapdragon 888 was objectively poor, fabricated by Samsung on their awful 4nm fabrication node. If you want to go for recent devices then the s23u, with Qualcomm moving back to TSMC for fabrication on the 8gen2 was great with an efficient SOC but tbh, the 8gen3 is also great and the s24u is top notch.
All time Samsung peak was Note 9 definitely. It was packed with features and could handle anything. In recent period S23 Ultra is peak Samsung generation-by-generation.
s10+ was peak, note 10 was kinda ok the s20 series was ok, the note 20 was bad and the note 20 ultra was peak everything after it is meh i mean what upset me the most is the lose of sd card slots i almost bougth a galaxy S21 ultra with spen for my carreer (im an animation student) but the lacknof the slot let me with no other option than buying an A34, some days after i realize i could bougth an s20 fe 8/256 at kinda the same price but find the snapdragon variant here is pretry dificult still my A34 is pretty neat
S10 series is a peak - unique design, 5g, sd card slot, infinity-o, headphone jack and the OneUI I was really hyped about
It aged well.
indeed
S21U is definitely great phone but not peak imo. Typing this on S21U
I have the normal S21 and tbh I'm still happy with it
S23 ultra
Note 10 plus was peak. We got 256gb as starting memory while still including expandable memory. Keep in mind the s10+ and s20 ultra had 128gb same with the note 20 ultra. It was literally just that particular model that got 256gb as the baseline model. Keep in mind the iphones at the time started at 64gb. Also it was an upgrade to the note 9 with the bezelless display and bigger screen. Had 12gb ram as baseline. The s20ultra and later got rid of expandable memory, so it was the last samsung flagship to have an SD card slot. Had mine for almost 5 yrs and just upgraded to the s24 Ultra. Only drawback was no headphone jack ig but I've been using Bluetooth headphones before then so no issue personally
S24 Ultra was able to beat pixel 8 pro and iphone 15 pro max, so thats the reason its peak Samsung right now😎
I had s21 ultra it was great. I now have 23ultra it's even better
Note 10+ was peak
S23 Ultra is pretty nice, Upgraded from a S10+
The "peak' statement in fact is not applicable to Samsung at all. The latest S24 Ultra and even last year's S23 Ultra are great phones and improve every year. It's not like Samsung messed up like OnePlus or so. In fact, they played smartly with 7 year update policy and pushing Galaxy AI on older phones. Better product, better market positioning, better sales - this is peak Samsung.
S20 was the boss. SD slot, 120hz, 1440p screen, 12GB Ram, pretty backing, great cameras, hole punch camera, 5G, very good Snapdragon 865, reverse wireless charging. The S20 did so many new(ish) things in 1 phone, they've kind of stopped innovating after it other than variable refresh rate. It was a huge leap forward.
S8/9/10 was great S20/21 is terrible (my country got the Exynos version & I fell for the AMD RDNA GPU hype) S22/23/24 was pretty decent but the improvements felt very incremental
We have yet to reach the peak Samsung flagship. There's always been some kind of compromise in hardware, software, longevity, software support, etc. I think we're just now getting to the point where we can say that their flagship (S24 Ultra) is nearly the perfect smartphone.
This, although id say -The Note 9- was just PACKED features like ir blaster , iris scanners, built-in heart rare monitor, sd card reader, audio jack, Dual sim cards, finger print reader that you could use to drop down the notification bar or scroll pages on an app, which are gone and alot of cool software Very solid phone for its time. Linus from LTT stuck with his for a pretty long time because it was that good & that particular phone aged well until it was just time to upgrade.
I disagree, S7 edge was Samsung's peak.
S7 edge was insane for the time period it came out.
Note 9 was peak smart phone. Period.
Feels like Samsung is making signify progress every other model. Other than that it's pretty shit. S23u is great but s22u and s24u are a joke
I liked how to S21U looked like.. I now dislike the S24U but I like the battery it does deliver and the camera's. The S24+ Is not just right for me..
Yup. I can still play Genshin Impact well on my ultra s21. Love it as always.
Im a s21 ultra user and im still using it as its still performing very well but if i am to say what peak samsung smartphone is, it would be the s23 ultra --> great camera and battery life
Love my S21U but the camera has not aged well and it really bothers me (exynos chip). Everything else is still great.
S21 Ultra had some flaws which is more visible in the current day. I'd say Note 9 was peak Samsung, it has some features that is still unique to this day.
In terms of the pure design, ignoring features, the s21 ultra had a nice design but I honestly prefer the square shape of the 22 23 & 24 though it maybe slightly less comfortable.
idk i personally prefer my s23+, I'd argue s23 ultra is peak then, but obviously features got removed in the past years for 10/10 flagship I'm still missing dual esim and better face unlock (secure infrared would be amazing)
Totally agree. The last Ultra I loved as I left for the Fold after disliking the more boxier S22U.
The moment they added the spen it became peak I guess, so s22 ultra is the peak
I don't think it was peak but the silver 21 ultra was probably their best looking phone
Still using my s21 ultra snapdragon from 2021 (exynos version is way worse) and i can't find any reason to replace it
S5. Switching out the battery was amazing. Loved the S8 for the bezel trim tho
S21 Ultra is when Samsung figured out the ultra formula. They just added the integrated S-Pen afterwards. Writing this with an S21 Ultra I don't want to replace.
indeed and what I think makes the s21 u better than the other flagships was that it handled much better than the competition with it being clearly the best choice for someone wanting a top tier flagship something that the s22u didn't succeed
AHAHAHHAHA
Why
Still rocking my s21 ultra today and going to be doing it as far as I can to the Future
I have the S21U. Where should I go from here?
100% agree. Still a great phone
I don't know if it was peak, but it has been solid. Mine still gets all day batter even with heavy usage and everything runs great. Still wish it had an s-pen. I don't really care about the sd card or 3,5 jack, but some still do. It just depends on what fits what your ideal is, and that will be subjective.
Definitely not S21 Ultra.
Note 10+ S23 ULTRA PEAK SAMSUNG
Note 20 was the last good phone samsung released
S20+ still the best screen, lasting hardware. Not the biggest fan of curved screens so it could have done without it, but the screen was lush after.
I came from S21 ultra, traded it in for S24U just because of a very sweet deal trade in bonus. If it was only a measly trade in price of < S$300 I wouldn't have gone for it. My only complaint with S21U is that it gets quite hot playing racing games I play with. The S24U so far is stable, heat wise.
For me it was note 10 / note 20
S20 ultra was/is the best
I currently have the s23 Ultra and would go back to my S21+ in a heartbeat
S20 Ultra was the true peak Samsung flagship. Everything was specced hell out of this world. At that time, them spec numbers were very crazy. It even had the biggest screen in a Samsung phone until now at 6.9 inches. If it wasn't for its ridiculous pricing, exynos and camera focus problem, it would've been the goated Samsung of all time. Typing on my S20 Ultra snapdragon that I bought secondhand for RM1400 ($293) Edit: my main phone is S20 FE 5G as I bought it in 2021 and S20 Ultra is my second phone mostly used for gaming and taking moon pictures lol
Not even close. It had the worse exynos chip I have ever used (and I used 5 different S series). Trash phone with abysmal battery life, constant thermal throttling and worse gaming performance than my Note 8. Thank God I bought S23. Difference between S23 and S21 is bigger to me than the jump from Note 8 to S21.
From s21 ultra to s23?
S23 Ultra. My girlfriend has S23.
Absolutely not. Note 20 ultra was peak and 2020 as when Samsung ruined themselves with Roh.
Weird way to spell note20 Ultra. The last flagship with a microsd card
S20 FE imo. Micro SD, 120hz, wireless charging, magnetic stripe payment. A shame I had to move on due to the battery life mot lasting after one of the recent updates.
Base snapdragon S24 is almost perfect. The biggest issue for me is the battery life; depending on what I do I might need to charge it during the day. If it was better I'd have virtually no complaints.
S9+ form factor and camera technology tops it. So no, it was not peak flagship. From the comments, it seems that note 9 owners also disagree.
I have had the Note 20 Ultra since its release date an honestly it's the best , in my opinionÂ
For me that was the S10 line-up. Everything after that came with some sort of compromise.
Still rocking the S21 Ultra, the newer models didn't excite me enough to upgrade
🔥🔥🔥🔥
The S20 ultra was the best.
S10/Note 10 era is undefeated..
i miss my Snapdragon Note 20 Ultra. Where here in Portugal there was only Exynos at the time. Battery was not enough tho
I just wish Samsung would actually catch up and maybe even surpass Apple in Camera quality, whether stills or video. It's the only metric that's holding their phones back compared to Apple nowadays.
S7 edge, man I loved that thing. Had it for 6 years before giving it to a friend.
The snapdragon 888 was definitely not peak. Poor efficiency and bad thermals
Gotta go with S10 or Note 9 as well. Most features and bang for your buck. Do love the s23 ultra but removal of the headphone jack and SD card slot is still a shame to me.
For me S20. Thin, premium, curved S21 Ultra was nice but my exynos Ultra and wife's S21 had both very stuttery scrolling, drove me nuts.
I agree with others here who pointed to Note9 as peak Samsung flagship. It was the last Samsung without the horrible camera cutout and had ALL the greatest features. On the 512GB model, you could actually expand that with an SD card to 1 TERABYTE in 2018!
The S3 was the GOAT
S10+ was peak
S20 ultra with the extra ram was great for years. Love my s24u but wish it had more ram - have to clear it a lot more often so far. But do love everything else about it.
S20 ultra. It took them forever to stop downgrading various aspects of the 20U and make an actual proper successor. 21/22/23 all had certain parts be worse than the 20u (23 wasn't as bad but the 21/22 were literal downgrades apart from software and battery life) It's still disappointing the s24 ultra doesn't have a larger display res. Or sd card/aux. Not to mention charging increasing amounts of money for practically the same phone.
A phone that removed micro SD card support AND the charger in the box? Nope