Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra officially revealed: 7 things you need to know from our hands-on testing

AI, AI, AI — and a little bit of that artificial intelligence stuff popped on top for good measure. That’s the message of the day for the newly-unveiled Samsung Galaxy S25 line up — and we’ve been among the first in the world to get hands on to see what makes Samsung’s flagship smartphone line-up for 2025 tick.

There are three new handsets launching for pre-order today, each packed to bursting with features powered by Galaxy AI — Samsung’s Google Gemini-aided artificial intelligence package. The Samsung Galaxy S25 and Samsung Galaxy S25+ kick off the range, and though there are more similarities than differences between the options this year, it’s the top-end Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra that threatens our bank accounts the most.

From its bespoke chipset to its super-zooming camera, here’s everything you need to know about the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra — and what sets it apart from its S25 stablemates, too.

1. AI all over

Artificial intelligence features are the beating heart of the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, integrated at almost every level of its One UI 7 interface. Combining on-device AI processing with Galaxy AI and off-device cloud features via Google Gemini, almost every interaction with the handset can be enhanced in some way by AI.

Hammering home the point is how easily the AI voice assistant can be invoked — simply hold down the side button, and you can chat naturally with the AI helper, “umms”, “ahhs” and all. Contextually aware, you’re no longer limited to stilted, stock phrases, letting you more easily and fluently communicate your needs, hands free.

So how’s this play out, on-device? Some of what are now becoming standardised AI features are present, for starters — so that’s AI image generation and editing, call transcription and text summaries to name just a few. But it’s the way AI can interact with your apps on your behalf where things get interesting.

Say you wanted to set a calendar reminder for every F1 race coming up in the racing season — you could ask the AI to find the races and the start times, and not only list them, but instantly add them to your calendar as well. The same goes for searching for specific places or objects from your photo library, or tweaking settings like font sizes and connectivity settings. No more digging around in menus or albums for the items you need.

If talking to tech still freaks you out, many of these features can be easily accessed by swiping in from the right edge of the screen, bringing up a side bar of quick-access AI features. One of the most powerful of these is Circle to Search — which works particularly well with the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s pop-out stylus, which sits in the bottom edge of the phone’s frame. With Circle to Search, you can draw a loop around any onscreen element of your phone, and get instant contextual information about the item that’s been lassoed. If that’s a pair of trainers that might be the make and shopping information, if it’s a phone number or URL a quick jump to the phone app or browser — even if they’re drawn from a hastily-snapped photo at a dodgy angle.

All these details combine for an intermittent summary of your day, too. The Now Brief keeps a track of your habits, interactions, calendar info and even photo snaps, and will offer up a personalised run down of useful information at different points in the day for you. It gets smarter the more it learns how you use your handset, and for those worried about privacy invasions, they’re protected against — Samsung says the details of your ‘Personal Data Engine’ never leave the device, and are protected by ‘post-quantum cryptography’, a highfalutin way of saying it can defend against some of the most powerful cyber attacks.

Now, like pretty much every AI-powered product we’ve tested so far, the results aren’t quite yet perfect, and we’d argue against relying on the information the assistant offers as a sole means of fact-finding or fuelling creative efforts.

For instance, in our brief testing we got an unsatisfactory answer when requesting a list of our favourite bands’ album releases and chart positions — something that even a quick Wikipedia scan can offer, while a request for an AI image generation showing a pizza riding a cat (as opposed to the passè cat riding a pizza) only ever resulted in an image with the cat firmly taking the reins.

The knowledge summaries can be patchy, and creative efforts only ever seem iterative rather than anything groundbreaking (yes, a pizza riding a cat would be groundbreaking).

2. Pocketable power

Yes, we get this every year, but this is the most powerful Samsung Galaxy device, ever! The whole Samsung Galaxy S25 range is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset, built specifically for these devices. Samsung’s promising “a performance boost of 40% in NPU, 37% in CPU and 30% in GPU compared to the previous generation” — and that translates most usefully in the ability to carry out way more of the above-mentioned AI tasks on-device than before, meaning they’ll work even when you’re away from a network.

That’s a big deal for mobile gamers as well. Ray Tracing, the graphical technique in gaming that presents more realistic light sources, shadows and reflections, runs better than ever before on a Samsung device, letting developers run wild with more realistic mobile gaming applications.

And Samsung promises it can handle this without the device getting too toasty, with a new heat management system that dissipates with a 40% larger vapour chamber.

3. Super-zooming camera and super-smooth display

The cameras on the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra make a generational leap too. The headline change is the jump from 12MP to 50MP for the ultrawide camera sensor, joining the 200MP wide camera, 10MP (3x) and 50MP (5x) tele, and the returning, insane, 100x ‘Space Zoom’, which leans (perhaps too heavily) on the ProVisual Engine to bring detail and clarity — and a fair drop or artistic license — to shots that push digital zoom capabilities to their limits.

Video recording also has some smart new tricks. Footage is captured in 10-bit HDR as standard now, resulting in far more colour pop in clips, with better low-light performance and reduced image noise.

Speaking of reduced aural noise, a new Audio Eraser tool can now isolate unwanted sounds in a recording (crowds, wind, music, voices and nature) and dial them back or remove them entirely to focus on the dialogue or sonic details that matter to you.

All these snaps and clips are displayed on the lush 6.9-inch display. It’s running at a sharp QHD+ resolution, and makes use of a Dynamic AMOLED panel to show everything in richly-coloured, vibrant glory.

4. Titanium toughness

Let’s quickly get some physical stats out of the way here. The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra measures 77.6 x 162.8 x 8.2 and weighs 218g. It’s a big boi then, but only as much as the rival top tier Apple alternative, the iPhone 16 Pro Max. Though the device itself looks very squared off, there’s a slight curve to the edges that make it easy to hold.

Big, and tough, we should add. The Galaxy S25 Ultra opts for a titanium frame whereas the rest of the range makes do with aluminium, and gives added protection to its screen’s front glass with a new Corning Gorilla Armor 2 panel that’s anti-reflective and more protected against scratches and drop-caused shatters than ever before.

5. The best of the rest of the features

A quick rundown of the best of the rest Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra features: It’s finished off with Wi-Fi 7 and UWB for super-quick connectivity; a larger 5,000mAh battery promises all day use without reaching for a charger; you’ve got under-display ultrasonic fingerprint scanning and facial recognition for security; IP68 waterproofing; fast charging and wireless charging support.

6. What about the S25 and S25+?

As we said at the start, much of what makes the S25 Ultra special trickles across the standard S25 and S25+, too. All are using a Dynamic AMOLED display, all take advantage of the speedy Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset, and all take advantage of the One UI 7 interface and its embedded AI features. But there’s some key differences to note, too:

• Screen size and resolution: The Galaxy S25 drops to a 6.2-inch display with FHD+ resolution, while the Galaxy S25+ retains the QHD+ resolution but drops to a 6.7-inch screen size.
• Dimensions: You’re looking at 70.5mm x 146.9mm x 7.2mm size and a 162g weight for the S25, while the S25+ is a touch bigger at 75.8mm x 158.4mm x 7.3mm and 190g.
• Cameras: Both Galaxy S25 and S25+ handset’s cameras max out at 50MP wide, 12MP ultra wide, and 10MP 3x zoom tele lenses, with a 30x digital “Space Zoom”. Video recording tops out at 4K @ 60fps, and 8K @30fps.
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• Storage: The Galaxy S25 comes in 128GB and 256GB sizes, while the S25+ offers 256GB and 512GB storage.
• Battery: A 4,000mAh battery is in the Galaxy S25, while the S25+ gets a 4,900mAh battery. How that corresponds to actual usage time between charges remains to be seen, given the varied screen sizes and resolutions of each handset.
• Durability: While the S25 Ultra has a super-strong Enhanced Corning Gorilla Armor front glass piece, the S25 and S25+ make do with standard Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2 up front. Their frames are also made of aluminium, whereas the S25 Ultra makes use of titanium.

7. Pricing and availability

All Samsung Galaxy S25 models go up for pre-order in the UK today (January 22nd) and hitting stores on February 7th, with a pre-order offer that doubles storage size at no extra cost for orders made directly from Samsung.com. Prepare your wallets: here’s the pricing breakdown, plus the available colours for each model.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra: 256GB - £1,249 | 512GB - £1,349 | 1TB – £1,549
Titan Black, Titan Gray, Titan Silverblue, Titan Whitesilver

Samsung Galaxy S25+: 256GB – £999 | 512GB – £1,099
Icyblue, Navy, Mint, Silver Shadow

Samsung Galaxy S25: 128GB – £799 | 256GB – £859 | 512GB - £979
Icyblue, Navy, Mint, Silver Shadow