The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra is here, and it’s packing some seriously impressive next-gen technology, including a heavy focus on AI. Samsung has introduced some exciting new features here, while also retaining the foundation that has made the Ultra series a top choice in the flagship market for a long time. With the recent release, I was given the opportunity to try Samsung’s new powerhouse phone out. So, let’s break down some of my favourite things about the Galaxy S25 Ultra…
Design
The Galaxy S25 Ultra has a sleek, flat design with rounded corners, giving it a modern look. The standout feature is the floating camera design that draws attention to the phone and showcases its impressive photographic capabilities. I was impressed to find the phone didn’t feel top-heavy, even with the large camera array up top. Being the Galaxy S25 ‘Ultra’, it’s naturally on the bigger side. It would be weird if it wasn’t! Nevertheless, the phone feels comfortable at just 218g (14g lighter than the S24 Ultra), and I love the way the weight is evenly distributed. If you’re after an even lighter and more compact experience, the Galaxy S25 and the Galaxy S25 Plus are ready to cater to your needs. If you’re like me, you won’t be able to imagine going for anything other than the biggest, and that’s exactly what this Galaxy S25 Ultra, and its large and immersive display, offer. It’s not so big that you can’t go one-handed, when necessary, but I definitely found myself opting for both hands most of the time.
The Galaxy S25 Ultra comes in Titanium Black, Titanium Blue, Titanium Silver, and Titanium Grey. I had the Titanium Grey model to try out, and I found that its minimalist aesthetic makes for a clean, understated look that fits right in with today’s flagship designs. Simple, but definitely classy. Although, unlike me, most people would immediately have this bad boy in a case, so aside from the expansive display, you probably won’t get to appreciate the design of this phone on a day-to-day basis.
Display
Speaking of gorgeous displays, the Galaxy S25 Ultra boasts a stunning 6.9-inch (17.5 cm) Dynamic AMOLED 2X display, offering Quad HD+ resolution (3120x1440). The display is sharp, vibrant, and incredibly immersive. I must admit, I couldn’t help but keep it in QHD+ mode pretty much the whole time, though it’s likely I’d be more inclined to FHD+ in the long run, given the increase in battery performance that FHD+ offers. The great thing is it doesn’t feel like a trade-off, although there’s no denying it is, because the FHD+ still looks gorgeous, and when coupled with the battery gains, it makes for an enjoyable experience.
Another thing I loved about the display was how dim the brightness can get. I must admit I usually keep my phone on the highest brightness possible, but I found it impressive that the phone offers such an impressive range from 2,600 nits max, which handles the outdoors with ease, to the low end which many will be extremely grateful for as the day draws nearer to bedtime.
Overall, this display is an absolute pleasure to use. The ultra-thin bezels make the phone a real looker, with both the screen on and off! I’m relatively new to this role and dropping or scratching the new phone I was given to try didn’t seem like the best idea. So unfortunately, I can’t speak on the durability except to say that Samsung has used Corning Gorilla Armor 2, which will handle pretty much any accident you can throw at a phone. There’s really nothing not to love here.
Camera
The Galaxy S25 Ultra introduces a new 50MP f/1.9 ultra-wide camera, with an impressive 120-degree field of view. This was implemented to provide more detail in your shots, and also improve the quality of macro shots. Alongside that, the phone packs a 200MP f/1.7 main camera, a 50MP f/3.4 telephoto camera with 5x optical zoom, and a 10MP f/2.4 telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom. These lenses give you a wide range of options for capturing everything from wide landscapes to detailed close-ups.
The photo quality is, as expected from Samsung, excellent. Colours are vivid, and the details are sharp. I was quite happy with the selfies I got from the front camera as well. The selfie pictures felt authentic, and although some folks prefer a bit of enhancement on their selfies, which there is still a bit of here, the selfies remain genuine enough. They also manage to get a lot of light, which is nice as it ensures you don’t come out looking dull, although they are brighter than reality.
In the Zoom department, the Galaxy S25 Ultra can reach up to 100x digital zoom. Now you’re probably not going to use this all too often, but it works surprisingly well. I managed to score an epic flick of the moon one night, which you’ll see below. It takes a bit of time to get it perfect, but when you do, you can really walk away with some nice pictures. For everyday use, the 3x, 5x, and 10x zoom are perfect and produce great quality images with little effort.
Video recording is also fantastic, with high-quality footage and a zoom-slider that works seamlessly. Whether you’re recording fast-moving moments or just anything really, the Galaxy S25 Ultra ensures your videos turn out steady and crisp. The zoom-slider led to an immediately smooth video on my first try, so that was also encouraging.
Software/AI
The new One UI 7 brings a range of features, although the biggest talking point is the new AI features. Before we get into that though, the options now available when you swipe down from the top of the screen are definitely convenient. Swiping down from the right side of the screen will bring up the quick settings while swiping down from the left will show you your notifications.
Moving onto AI, Samsung is now heavily favouring Google’s Gemini, which plays a big role in the Galaxy S25 Ultra. The biggest talking point is cross-app functionality, which essentially allows Gemini to do things like find a picture, and then also send it to a friend. This is definitely a good example of how AI is progressing. There’s also the ‘Now Bar’ and ‘Now Brief’. The Now Bar feature allows you to see things like live notifications, music, modes, and more on the lock screen. Now Brief aims to provide a quick snapshot of your day with things like the weather, news, and calendar appointments. I don’t want to comment too much on Now Brief because the idea is that it gets to know you over time, and it’s safe to say that in this short period of time, we are definitely still in the talking stage, at best. What I will say though is that it’s an intriguing feature, and I’m excited to see how it progresses over time.
Another AI feature that I found cool was ‘Circle to Search’. Given that the Galaxy S25 Ultra has a stylus (S Pen), it’s kind of the perfect phone with which to try this feature. Simply circle anything on your screen and AI will immediately search the web based on the content you have circled. I found myself using this feature a lot more than I would have thought, and it worked pretty well each time. In fact, I found it so fun that it almost hindered my productivity, as I kept searching up things I didn’t actually need to! Speaking of fun distractions, Drawing Assist is a cool feature that turns your drawings into a range of different types of animation, with AI. It won’t quite create something you can hang at the Louvre, but it’s super fun and could add layers to your group chat banter.
Overall, the AI features I got to try worked well, and I think with AI it really comes down to how much you plan on using it. Everyone is different, and for some, the newest AI features won’t be a necessity or life-changing. If you enjoy having a lot of fun though, or using AI to boost productivity, then you will be happy with the performance of the AI features on the Galaxy S25 Ultra.
Performance and Battery
In the engine department, this is one of the best-performing phones on the market, if not the best in some areas. The chip from Qualcomm is the fastest they’ve made so far and was made specifically for Samsung. With numerous apps open it still doesn’t miss a beat, gliding from one to the other with ease and speed. It also performs well when completing AI tasks. Given that this is a new area in phones, well, relatively new, it’s important to remember that AI tasks are quite demanding, so the speed and efficiency with which a phone can complete AI tasks are key considerations. Overall, the Galaxy S25 Ultra will handle anything you’d want to throw at a phone, figuratively not literally, and makes for an enjoyable experience. In Geekbench 6, we got a single-core score of 3215 and a multi-core score of 10,158. Those are very high numbers and enable the Galaxy S25 Ultra to join just one or two other phones atop the smartphone performance rankings.
Final Thoughts
The Galaxy S25 Ultra is yet another premium Samsung phone that sits right next to and arguably even above other flagship phones on the market. Performance-wise the phone is showing some really fast, industry-leading numbers via its unique processor, and other hardware like the cameras and display are of the highest standard too. There’s also a wide range of AI features that work well and will definitely enhance the experience of anyone using the phone.
If you’re in the market for a new phone, and specifically looking for a top-of-the-range one, the Galaxy S25 Ultra will not lead you astray. This remains one of the best phones on the market, and the new features have complemented the existing foundation well.
This article was created in a paid partnership with Samsung New Zealand.
