No prizes for correctly guessing that today’s big Unpacked news is about the Samsung Galaxy S24 series. As expected, the Korean hardware giant has just unveiled its latest flagship, including the Galaxy S24, Galaxy S24+ and Galaxy S24 Ultra. The devices start at $800, $1,000 and $1,300, respectively.
Also, as expected, Samsung is leaning heavily on AI for today’s announcement. Phone makers have been talking about AI for nearly a decade at this point, but the technology will continue to occupy more minds in the future, essentially in the wake of last year’s AI boom.
Samsung may be among the first device makers to put this technology as a software enhancement to its smartphone lineup, but it certainly won’t be the last. I hope you’re not sick of hearing about genetic AI yet, because the buzzword is going to permeate device startups for at least the next two years.
In the case of the S24 series, these improvements – perhaps unsurprisingly – focus heavily on image processing. Samsung writes:
After taking great shots, the innovative Galaxy AI editing tools allow for simple edits like erase, recompose and remaster. For easier and more effective optimizations, Edit Suggestion uses Galaxy AI to suggest perfectly suitable edits for each photo. To give users even more creative control and freedom, Generative Edit can fill in parts of an image background with genetic AI. When an image is crooked, the AI will fill in the outlines.
Image Credits: Samsung
Whenever the device uses genetic AI in the editing process, it will add a digital watermark to the image, as well as metadata, which sets a good precedent for this brave new world. This includes another new feature, Instant Slow-mo, which creates additional frames to provide a more complete slow-motion experience. Very curious to see how seamless this experience is.
Another fun new feature was announced in partnership with Google this morning. The S24 will get Circle for Search, which pretty much does what it says on the box. Circle a piece of text with your finger or the S-Pen and you’ll trigger a Google search on the word. Google tends to roll out these kinds of features on its own Pixel devices, so this is an interesting break from recent tradition.
The two companies, however, have been working closely in the software space for the past few years. This includes Google’s release of a foldable version of Android, as well as Samsung’s long-awaited embrace of Wear OS on its Galaxy Watch devices.
Image Credits: Samsung
The device will leverage Google’s homegrown model, the Gemini Pro. Here is Google:
With Gemini Pro, our best model for scaling across a wide range of tasks, you can interact with familiar Samsung apps in more useful ways than ever before. In the new Galaxy S24 series, Samsung’s Notes, Voice Recorder and Keyboard apps will use Gemini Pro to offer better summarizing capabilities. For example, you can record a lecture using the voice recorder and quickly get a summary of the most important parts of the lesson. And with Imagen 2, Google’s advanced text-to-image diffusion technology, you’ll be able to access useful photo editing features using Generative Edit in the Galaxy S24 Gallery app.
The Galaxy S24 series will also be integrated with Gemini Nano, the most efficient model for tasks on the device, to enable a new feature in Google Messages and ensure that your data does not leave your smartphone. In addition, Samsung will be one of the first partners to test Gemini Ultra, our largest model for highly complex tasks, before it becomes widely available to developers and enterprise customers later this year.
Artificial intelligence is not limited to post-production this time. The offering will also play a role in the shots themselves, continuing the push for increased computational photography. In the week that Apple is showing Vision Pro to select journalists, Samsung is talking about “ProVisual,” a new imaging engine.
“The Galaxy S24 series’ ProVisual Engine is a comprehensive suite of AI-powered tools that transform your image-taking capabilities and maximize creative freedom every step of the way, from creating a shot to sharing it on social,” the company writes. “Gone are the jarring, pictorial images taken from afar. The Galaxy S24 Ultra’s Quad Tele system, with a new 5x optical zoom lens, works with the 50MP sensor to deliver optical quality at zoom levels from 2x, 3x, 5x to 10x magnification thanks to the Adaptive Pixel Sensor. Images also show crystal clear results at 100x with enhanced digital zoom.”
Interestingly (though also mentioned before), the S24 Ultra halves its predecessor’s 10x optical zoom to 5x. You should still be able to get a good shot at 10x zoom, although it will be “optical quality”, rather than straight optical zoom, which will likely degrade the image somewhat, depending on things like light level. Optical zoom shots are taken at 3x and 5x zoom, thanks to the camera hardware.
The Galaxy S24 Ultra also features 60% larger pixels than its predecessor, letting in more light. This, in turn, will improve the device’s low-light shooting (“Nightography”). There have also been improvements to the optical image stabilizer (OIS) for less blurry photos, while the ISP (image signal processor) should do a better job of processing image noise. Samsung again, “Galaxy S24 analyzes gyroscope information to distinguish between video and subject motion. This allows for more effective noise removal and clear videos in the dark, even from far away.”
Image Credits: Samsung
Super HDR mode, meanwhile, brings HDR to previews, meaning you don’t have to wait for the photo to be taken in the process to get the full effect. Samsung will also open up its HDR offering to third-party app developers.
Much of what the devices can do in the AI department is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip.
“Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy infuses its advanced AI capabilities into the Galaxy S24 series to enable new experiences with AI features that empower users’ everyday lives,” says Qualcomm SVP Chris Patrick in a edition linked to today’s news. “It will also power advanced professional-grade camera, gaming experiences and ultra-fast connectivity, including Wi-Fi 7, while offering one of the most reliable authentication solutions available with Qualcomm® 3D Sonic Gen 2 technology.”
The Galaxy S24 Ultra comes in 256GB, 512GB and 1TB capacities, with the Galaxy S24+ at 256GB or 512GB and the Galaxy S24 offering 128GB and 256GB of storage. Like the iPhone 15 before it, the S24 Ultra is also available in titanium.
The S24, S24+ and S24 Ultra have 6.2-, 6.7- and 6.8-inch displays, respectively. All three models feature adaptive refresh rates for their respective displays, ranging from 1 to 120 Hz, along with an impressive 2,600 nit peak brightness. The device also features “optically enhanced” Corning Gorilla Armor glass for better scratch and drop resistance.
When it comes to sustainability, the Ultra uses metal made from 40% recycled steel and 100% recycled rare earth elements for its speakers. At least half of the battery’s cobalt is recycled. The packaging for all three, meanwhile, is made from 100% recycled paper.
Pre-order for all three devices opens today. They will hit store shelves on the last day of the month.
