Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra The price of the phone in India starts at Rs 1,09,999. Is this the ultimate Android flagship at this price? I spent some time with this phone and based on this I am sharing my first impressions.
Samsung Galaxy S22 And Galaxy S22+ Almost the entire design is similar to the S21 series. But Galaxy S22 Ultra It is a little different from these. Its design reflects the Galaxy Note 20 series. However, Samsung did not launch any successor for it.
The Galaxy S22 Ultra looks similar to the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra. The curved metal frame houses the large display curve. The phone is comfortable to hold and its curves do not make the width of its large display feel. The top and bottom parts of the phone are completely flat.
Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra has a silo (place to hold the pen) for its S Pen. This has been done for the first time in the Galaxy S series. The phone has a 5,000mAh battery with support for 45W fast charging. But for this you will have to buy the charger separately. The phone weighs 229 grams which feels heavy in the hand but still the weight is well balanced. Both the handset and the S Pen come with an IP68 rating which is capable of protecting against dust and water.
The rear panel of the phone has a quad camera setup, but instead of a single module, five separate circles for the lenses come out of the panel. The primary camera is 108 megapixels with phase detection autofocus (PDAF). There is a 12-megapixel ultrawide angle camera with 120 degree field of view. The third sensor is a 10-megapixel telephoto camera with 10X optical zoom. The fourth sensor is a 10-megapixel telephoto lens with 3X optical zoom. There is a 40-megapixel selfie camera on the front. Samsung claims that better low-light photography can be done in the phone and the company has called it Nightography. I will test it in the full review.
Talking about the display, it has a 6.8-inch QuadHD Plus panel that comes with HDR10+ certification. Its maximum refresh rate is 120 Hz. Depending on what you are doing on the phone, it can also take the refresh rate down to 1Hz. The display shows deep black which I liked a lot. The peak brightness of the display is said to be 1750 nits, which makes it easily readable even in direct sunlight. Stereo speakers add to the overall experience of the phone.
In India, we have been seeing Exynos processors in Samsung phones, but this time the company has changed the trend and given Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor in the phone. The phone has 12 GB RAM and you can choose between 256 GB and 512 GB of storage. The price of 256 GB storage variant is Rs 1,09,999 while its 512 GB variant is priced at Rs 1,18,999. It can be purchased at a lower price under pre-booking offers. On pre-booking the phone, you can get Galaxy Watch 4 with a huge discount. S22 Ultra has been launched in Phantom White, Phantom Black and Burgundy color variants.
This Samsung flagship comes with Android 12 with OneUI 4.1. My unit was given the Android security patch of February 2022. The company has promised to provide operating system upgrades for four years and security updates for five years with it. In the short time I used the phone, the phone is quite fast. If you are a long-time Samsung user then you will also like the user interface.
The build quality of the Galaxy S22 Ultra is quite impressive and its camera specifications are also attractive. It seems that Samsung has put the features of the Galaxy S and Galaxy Note series together in one phone with the aim of giving the best flagship. The phone comes with the features of both the series. The price has been increased slightly compared to the Galaxy S21 Ultra. But, the phone also has many features and it is affordable compared to the Apple iPhone 13 Pro. I will reserve my judgment on its performance, camera, battery life and other features until the testing of the phone is over. The full review of the device will be given soon, for that stay tuned to Gadgets 360.