Samsung Galaxy S24+ Review – The right size for a flagship

The Samsung Galaxy S24+ is part of the Galaxy S24 series that is making waves introducing it’s AI capability as the main selling point, but that’s not it, it has more to offer, whether it’s under the hood performance and some of the software enhancement that Samsung has polished up based on the experience from it’s previous Galaxy S Series.

Do take note that this review will also partially covers the S24 as well in terms of similarity in the SOC and build, except for the size and certain capacities, however internal storage speed remains the same.

Design – Same looking but stronger

Nothing it’s too far off from the Galaxy S23 series in terms of the outlook, but certainly from the glance, you cant identify it, but indeed there is some changes being done. First off is the satin finish, which I find it more refined this time with a new unified design, especially when held on to it, this is much symmetrical and balanced, especially when it comes to navigating between the holding till the finger/thumb navigation, it felt more natural. Next is the slight increase of the screen size to 6.7 inch from 6.6 inch, while it does not sound incredibly much, the screen to body ratio now stands at almost 92%, which in layman terms it means slimmer bezels between the screen and the body that is also protected by the Gorilla Glass Victus 2. IP68 dust/water resistant is still there along with the improved Armor Aluminium 2 frame which is much tougher and able to withstand harsher drops. The rest when it comes to the outlook, it is pretty much looking almost the same as the S23+.

Display and Audio – Slightly bigger but it is better.

First off, it does have larger screen compared to the previous generation, the Samsung Galaxy S24+ now houses a slightly bigger 6.7 inch screen in Dynamic LTPO AMOLED 2X blazing on 120Hz fast refresh rate screen that as the name implies, dynamically go as low as 10Hz when not in used or static. Screen to body ratio has also been improved to a near 92%, which gave a better wider view but also easier navigation on day to day use basis. Despite all of these the brightness can peak up to 2600nits enabling easy reading even under bright sunlight while at night it will automatically dial down the brightness for easy navigation without straining your eyes. The Samsung Galaxy S24+ is Widevine L1 certified for DRM streaming apps such as Netflix and Disney+. Basically this is one of the best you can get in terms of display capabilities, if not on par with most of the higher end phone display you can get out there.

Lets get on to the audio portion, as usual bring a flagship indeed it does have a dual firing speakers for all your ultimate experience, whether it is movies or games, while then this is backed by the slightly enhanced, and by experience much higher quality hardware and tuning from AKG along with Dolby Atmos. Overall the combined audio and visual gave a pretty good experience and still there is option to enhance further with customised EQ or just use the pre-defined ones.

Camera – Marvel shooter that all you ever need

Rear : 50 MP, f/1.8, 24mm (wide)
10 MP, f/2.4, 67mm (telephoto)
12 MP, f/2.2, 13mm, 120˚ (ultrawide)
Front : 12 MP, f/2.2, 26mm (wide)

While you will not get 200MP main camera sensor but you will still get a not just decent, but admirably good set of main camera and front camera. First off, this is improved compared to the last generation similar to what they have done over the S24 Ultra as well. Upon comparison, the hardware is really not too far off from the S23+ or the S22+ on the camera, but what’s amazing is the software has vastly improved to keep up with today’s imaging standard.

To start, we get a decent day and night pictures with processing that is still looking natural and not overblown, and it does shows a good balance in contrast and lighting control while the colors are rich coupled with clarity that can be zoomed with some minimal loss in details, especially if you are using digital zoom. The same praises goes to the selfie as well which I have no complain about. Overall this exemplifies the proper uphold of balance in quality and speed capture that is up to it’s paces.

This time around the video quality brings a less jittery more accurate in terms of frame pacing and color that is much appreciated and this again shows that the S24+ fares well, if not slightly better compared to it’s competitor, making it another stellar candidate on mobile video recording that can go up to 8K at 30FPS, or should you need more framerate, 4K 60FPS still remains one of the best as you have better stabilization.

Expert RAW, Pro Mode, Night Mode, Hyperlapse, Panorama, Slow Motion is available under the more section allowing more options on your photo and video taking style while the Gallery side is upgraded allowing smarter AI object removal, faster fill in and one tap remaster mode.

Performance, Interface and Hardware – The power of Exynos

Now hear me out, this time around Samsung’s Exynos 2400 really brings in one of the most out when it comes to the performance, stability and fluid in benchmark results, real world apps and games. This is simply really a strong competitor against both Qualcomm and MediaTek flagship that can go head to head in terms of tackling in one of the top tier SOC. The GPU which is the Xclipse 940 brings in vast improvement in gaming, and yes, it is indeed part of the AMD’s RDNA3 architecture inside, featuring modern capability such as mobile Ray Tracing and updated Vulkan API. RAM has been bumped up to 12GB LPDDR5 RAM with up to 512GB of fast UFS 4 storage for quick swap and loading over your favorite applications.

With it’s upgraded 4900 mAh battery, typically you will be expecting moderate usage around one day without recharging with a combination of calls, messages, social media, email, gaming and some web browsing, and for the most part, it held a better battery life and endurance compared to it’s predecessor, and this in part thanks to the good optimization from Android 14 and the brand new OneUI 6.1. Since we have touched about the UI, there is only minor update has been done cosmetically, but on the inside, the software remains top notch and as of this writing, there is update being pushed to the phone to improve things.

Lastly, here’s the benchmark for reference, and as mentioned, it’s performance is definitely one of the top tier flagship out there.

Galaxy AI – It’s a great start

One of the biggest selling point of the Galaxy S24 series is the Galaxy AI features, which harnesses all the power from the Exynos 2400 (and Snapdragon 8 Gen3 for other regions) and also the software that Samsung implemented with Google. I will just list some of the notable Galaxy AI features as below.

Circle to Search : By long pressing the HOME key, users can now activate circle to search by circling on object sighted on camera, or on your screen on your applications including the browser to initiate search that gives you the results from descriptions to shopping listings including price over the web, or information of the item, object, or subject in general.

Call Assist : This option enables calls to be translated live with voice two ways up to 13 languages almost an instant without internet/data connectivity and Samsung will still be adding new languages along the way. Among the notable languages supported : English, Portuguese, Spanish, French, Korean, German, Italian, Chinese(Simplified), Japanese, Hindi, Polish, Thai, and Vietnamese.

Chat Translation : Enables on device direct translation on 13 languages including sending messages, replying messages and receiving messages two way, with only a single party using any of the S24 series phone. Major 3rd party apps including WhatsApp is supported.

Style & Grammar : Uses AI to determine a line of sentences and changes draft sentences or messages to 5 different tone of writing, Professional, Emoji, Casual, Social, and Polite.

Auto Formatting and Correction : Allowing handwriting and typed information including notes to the auto formatted and spelling fixed. Formatting can be selected if different options, with multiple language supported with translation.

Web Translation and Summarize : This feature can be used independently or combined with Samsung Internet browser, allowing a part or the whole webpage to be translated, summarize, or both at the same time with easy readable text format. Text translated or summarized can be copied and pasted to another app, such as Samsung Notes.

If you wanted to know more about Galaxy AI, click here to read one of our articles.

Technical Specifications

So who is this for ?

A typical scenario would be someone who just needs a flagship phone that performs but not necessarily needing a very large screen to get the job done, while at the same camera optic and performance is up to the par and last long when it comes to multicore processing capability with a battery life that last the whole day without needing of repeating recharge while managing your social media or any workflow. AI takes on too that shares the same features as the Galaxy S24 Ultra.

Verdict & Conclusion

The Samsung Galaxy S24+ is taking on the AI era with the push that says that intelligence computing is now in your hand and pocket with all the ease of use you can get today, with the price tag starting from RM4599, which is for the many it is still considerably reasonably at this point of this writing. Getting it for it’s AI capability first hand and the camera hardware can be a reason why you should get one, while still you are still holding at one of the best SOC that you can get in a rightly sized form factor. While then many would look through the alternative model of brands, if you are using Samsung’s hardware and mobile ecosystem, such as DeX, this is another worth a close shot of choosing this phone.