Update Best Phone On Market 2021 Review – Readers voted the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra as the best phone of the year. It faced some stiff competition, especially from the Google Pixel 6 series, of which the vanilla model was our Editors’ Choice for 2021. But we’re a year on from the phone’s launch, so how does the Galaxy S21 Ultra stack up? 2022
Of course, this phone is still a favorite among our readers, so we know how you all feel. However, today we get to look at the Galaxy S21 Ultra through a 2022 lens. Not only do we have the Galaxy S22 line up, which we know from all the leaks will include a rumored Ultra variant, but we also have heavy hitters from OnePlus, Google and Xiaomi to think about.
Update Best Phone On Market 2021 Review
With all this in mind, is this phone still worth buying today? Let’s delve into our Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra long-term review and find out.
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For our initial review of the phone in January 2021, we awarded the Galaxy S21 Ultra 4.5/5 stars, ranking it among the best phones of the year. We were let down by what the phone had to offer in the basic processing, display and camera departments. Especially when compared to the Galaxy S20 Ultra, which we weren’t impressed with, especially in terms of design.
Six months after the phone’s launch, we’re still impressed. Even compared to Samsung’s new foldable phones, the Galaxy S21 Ultra is still worth buying. Its $1,200 starting price doesn’t stop us from continuing to recommend it.
With another six months to go, it’s time to give the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra the long-term review it deserves.
So far, the closest and newest 2022 Android competitor to the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra that we’ve seen is the OnePlus 10 Pro. a phone you can’t even buy outside of China. Interestingly, most of the specifications of those phones either match or don’t match the Galaxy S21 Ultra.
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For example, the battery size is the same (5000 mAh). The screens are also very similar – huge WQHD AMOLED displays with 120Hz adaptive refresh rates. Meanwhile, the Galaxy S21 Ultra has a higher amount of maximum RAM (up to 16GB) and a higher amount of maximum internal storage (up to 512GB). The Galaxy S21 Ultra’s camera specs are also far behind the OnePlus 10 Pro.
In both areas aside, the Galaxy S21 Ultra’s spec sheet is still better than the OnePlus 10 Pro.
In fact, the OnePlus 10 Pro beats the Galaxy S21 Ultra in only two areas: processor and charging speed. The processor of the 10 Pro is Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, which is the flagship of 2022. The Galaxy S21 Ultra’s year-old Snapdragon 888 and Exynos 2100 are by definition a mismatch. However, those chipsets are still monsters, not as much of a monster as the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1.
In fact, the 10 Pro’s charging speed is the only thing Samsung can’t compete with. The 10 Pro’s speeds are three times faster than the Galaxy S21 Ultra for both wired and wireless connections. It’s a shame, and we sincerely hope Samsung corrects this disparity with the Galaxy S22 series.
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Outside of the Android ecosystem, Apple’s iPhone 13 Pro Max was released in late 2021 and is a notable competitor to the Galaxy S21 Ultra. Again, Apple’s A15 Bionic processor is slightly more powerful, but not enough to make a meaningful difference in the day-to-day experience. Samsung phones remain competitive in the display, storage and charging departments. The Galaxy S21 Ultra also offers a more flexible and robust camera package than Apple’s latest premium iPhone.
Anyway, the point is that even in 2022, the Galaxy S21 Ultra is still a beast of a phone when it comes to raw specs. Even after a year, the phone can compete with other premium flagships. On the software front, the phone has already received the Android 12 update with Samsung’s own One UI 4 improvements on top. You can read more about the news at the link below.
Great specs are integral to making a great phone, but design is just as important. After all, poor design can make a phone look dated a year from now, as it sticks out like a sore thumb compared to its modern counterparts.
Fortunately, while testing the phone for this Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra long-term review, I never once found it to look better. This is notable because it was not the case for the 2020 model year. It’s good that Samsung moved away from the brutal and dare I say ugly design of the Galaxy S20 Ultra. The S21 Ultra’s understated camera bump and curved (but not too curved) sides built into the side of the device give it a minimalist aesthetic that can still look modern five years from now.
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Sure, it’s still a big and heavy phone. At up to 229g depending on the model, the Galaxy S21 Ultra will be a brick in your pocket if it even fits there. Holding its massive frame will be a bit cumbersome if you don’t have big enough hands, and using the device with one hand is basically silly.
However, people who want phones in this category already know and accept it. People like me wish there was a way to get all the specs and features of the Galaxy S21 Ultra in a smaller, lighter form, but that’s not going to happen anytime soon. As it is, the Galaxy S21 Ultra is still a beauty.
Our biggest issue with the Galaxy S20 Ultra was its camera. Despite some stellar hardware, the phone had issues with some basic features like autofocus. The Galaxy S21 Ultra, however, fixed all the issues we had with its predecessor, easily making it one of the best smartphone cameras in 2021 or any year.
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Surprisingly, the camera is still amazing today. Not only does it take great photos, but its dual telephoto system, which includes periscope lenses, allows for great versatility. Focus is no longer an issue and the latest One UI 4.0 software is enriched with shooting options including classic portrait and night modes. Combined with the aforementioned Snapdragon 888 processor, snapping photos and videos is lightning fast.
Speaking of video, the phone can shoot up to 8K at 24fps or 4K at 60fps, with the latter camera also available. The rear cameras all benefit from solid stabilization, and Samsung has some additional software tools to help capture shots as well. Director’s View lets you switch between wide and zoom lenses as you shoot, or you can use a single photo to automatically create single-frame videos as well as different images.
Below you can see some photos taken with the Galaxy S21 Ultra since it received the One UI 4.0 update in late November 2021.
Obviously, nothing is perfect, and the Galaxy S21 Ultra’s camera still has room for improvement. For example, Samsung can oversaturate colors in some cases, and sometimes the software gets a little overzealous with sharp processing transitions.
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If those two things annoy you, you can always try Samsung’s new Expert Raw Camera app. This app essentially takes Samsung’s computing systems out of the equation and lets you take full advantage of the S21 Ultra’s camera hardware. We don’t recommend it for casual users, but if you think that standard camera software is taking things too far, you’re probably not a casual user.
When Samsung coined the name Ultra, it was clear that the company was reserving phones that had everything you could ever want. In fact, some might argue that the Ultra phones we’ve seen so far go overboard in some areas, such as 16GB of RAM being completely unnecessary.
Unfortunately, the Galaxy S21 Ultra doesn’t live up to its name in some ways. The phone is missing here.
Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra and Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra. to date, other ultra phones also have expandable storage. The Galaxy S21 Ultra is the odd one out here, and it’s very disappointing.
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Yes, expandable storage is becoming more like headphone jacks, which means they’re disappearing from premium flagships at an alarming rate. Samsung could be forgiven for going with the trend here, but I think we should take it a notch higher with the word “Ultra” in its name.
This is especially disappointing when you remember that the phone can shoot 8K video, recording files at an average of 10MB per second. Of course, a 512GB version of the phone would solve that problem, but a microSD card slot would be cheaper and more convenient.
Rumors suggest that the Galaxy S22 Ultra may also lack expandable storage, so that’s it
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