Today, Samsung held a big presentation of the Galaxy Unpacked 2023, at which (it’s no secret anymore) it introduced the new flagships of the Galaxy S23 series. By the way, this is the first “live” presentation of flagships in 3 years, since before that, due to the pandemic, the company had to abandon mass events. Therefore, it took a lot of effort to prepare: Samsung even involved directors Ridley Scott (Ridley Scott) and Hong-Jin (Na Hong-Jin) to appreciate and demonstrate the advantages of the camera. Of course, more attention was paid to the top model – Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra.

What’s new

The flagship is very similar to last year’s Galaxy S22 Ultra – Samsung has made a minimum of changes to the appearance, leaving the same camera design, rectangular angular shape of the body and rounded display on the sides. Also in place is a built-in slot for the S Pen stylus and IP68 water resistance. The smartphone comes in three new colors – green, lavender and beige, which join the old Phantom Black. Gorilla Glass Victus 2 is used as a protective glass on the front and back.

A significant change was the processor, which is used in all models of the Galaxy S23 line. This is a special version of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. It has a Cortex-X3 core running at up to 3.36GHz, compared to the maximum frequency of 3.2GHz on the regular Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. In addition, the Adreno 740 GPU runs at 719 GHz, not 680 MHz. And yes, versions with proprietary Exynos chips this year will not be in any of the markets.

Another big upgrade is the main camera. It now includes a 200MP Samsung ISOCELL HP2 sensor that can combine 16 pixels into one for a final resolution of 12MP with custom sized pixels of 2.4µm. Or it can combine its pixels 4-to-1 and give you a 50-megapixel shot with more detail to work with. Users can also shoot RAW images with the benefits of multi-frame processing, use Expert RAW as a mode inside the camera app, or the new Astro video mode hyperlapse. The remaining three modules remain unchanged: a 10x periscope with an f/4.9 aperture, a 3x telephoto lens with an f/2.4 aperture, and a 12 MP ultra-wide-angle camera. For selfies, there is an improved 12-megapixel front camera with autofocus.

Otherwise, nothing new: a 6.8-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2x with a resolution of 1440×3088 pixels and an adaptive refresh rate from 1Hz to 120Hz, a 5000mAh battery and 45W fast charging.

How much

Galaxy S23 Ultra is available in four versions:

• 8/256 GB – $1199
• 12/256 GB – $1299
• 12/512 GB – $1399
• 12 GB / 1 TB – not yet known

A source: Samsung