Samsung brings the Galaxy Note back from the dead with a new name — Galaxy S22 Ultra — and we love it

• The Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra gets the stylus and a 'Note'worthy design upgrade.
• It is the hero product in the S22 lineup and is also the most expensive with a $1,199 price tag (approx ₹90,000).
• It will compete against the best in the market like the iPhone 13 Pro, OnePlus 10 Pro and other upcoming phones.

Samsung held its Unpacked event yesterday and it revealed, or I must say, officially confirmed the new Galaxy Tab S8 series tablets and S22 smartphones. While there was little to be revealed, (thanks to the leaks) as always, the anticipation was high around one particular product — the Galaxy S22 Ultra.

The S22 Ultra, as many are saying, is merely a name change for the Note series. But I'd say what's in the name if the product is promising. Samsung wanted us to believe the Note is dead, well technically it is, but what we see as the Ultra variant this time is more like the Note than the S21 Ultra. It has got edges over curves to make for a boxy design that stands out from the S22 and S22+ and also resembles more like the previous Note device — with a 6.8-inch screen, a built-in S pen stylus, a prominent set of cameras, a $1,199 price tag (approx ₹90,000).

The stylus is a new addition to the S-series, and the other incremental upgrades are seen in the camera department. The major areas of improvement seem to be low light, portrait and video. Additionally, it gets faster wireless charging and the latest set of internals to give the best available flagship hardware.

Without a doubt, the S22 Ultra is the hero among the family and also boasts of a completely new design compared to the S21 Ultra. As mentioned, it is a refined-looking variation of the Note 20 Ultra with a boxy design and uses top of the line Qualcomm chipset — the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 in the US and for the first time in India as well.

The 6.8-inch OLED has 1440 x 3080p resolution, supports up to 120Hz variable refresh rate, HDR 10+ and it's very bright as it can reach 1,750 nit peak brightness if you are in direct sunlight. The display is also protected with Gorilla Glass Victus Plus on the front and back panels.

It has a 5000mAh battery that gets charged with 45W wired and 15W wireless charging speeds. This part of the spec sheet looks a bit dated as most flagship phones these days come with at least 65W charging except for Apple and Samsung. It's compatible with 5G, Wi-Fi 6 / Wi-Fi 6E, and offers IP68 weather resistance.

Samsung is also making big promises on the software front this time. It's promised four generations of software updates on its phones which previously used to be three years max.


The S Pen makes a comeback

The S-Pen has now made it to the S series after Samsung decided to drop the Note branding. A considerable portion of the presentation was taken by the stylus. The new S Pen is said to have reduced latency from 9 milliseconds to 2.8 milliseconds. The handwriting recognition has got better, and the feel of writing on paper has got more realistic as per the Samsung. The S22 Ultra also supports S pen air actions, like flipping through your photo gallery or controlling the phone’s camera remotely, without touching the screen.

The camera setup looks similar on paper but makes big claims

The cameras on the S22 Ultra share similarities with the S21 Ultra with a 108-megapixel main camera, 3x and 10x telephoto cameras, a 12-megapixel ultrawide, and a 40-megapixel selfie camera.

The focus this time has been around low light performance and videos. It now captures low light portraits in night mode and even high-resolution photos. In the previous model, you could either take a high-resolution photo or a night mode shot. It also claims a great-sounding update in the portrait mode with AI depth mapping that is said to imitate natural bokeh, which has been an issue with most phone cameras. Also, Samsung says that pet portrait mode photos are better now.

The S22 Ultra also features expert RAW out of the box, which essentially allows it to capture computational RAW images that allow the post-processing flexibility of RAW shooting.

The S22 Ultra checks all the boxes for a premium flagship phone, but it's not alone in that list. There are phones from Apple, OnePlus and others that offer the same, but the Ultra stands out because of its stylus and just like Samsung's own phones that stand out by folding or flipping.

The Galaxy S22 Ultra goes on sale from February 25th in 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB variants. The 128GB model has 8GB of RAM; all others include 12GB.

SEE ALSO:
Galaxy S22 vs Galaxy S22 Plus vs Galaxy S22 Ultra — How do the three flagship phones differ?
Samsung Galaxy S22 and S22+ get the much-needed makeover with camera and performance upgrades