Note 20 Ultra review: big phone, small updates
Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra
Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra. It is big, it is also pretty, it's an excellent screen, there's an enormous camera above. It's actually a small amount just like the Galaxy S20 Ultra version of the identical phone like, okay, actually plenty like Galaxy S20 Ultra, Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, S20 Ultra, Note 20 Ultra. Sorry, look, we'll get into some of the differences between these two phones later. the most point without delay is that well, i do not like that the Note 20 Ultra starts at 1300 bucks, I do like this phone and there is not some grand Samsung reinvented the Note story to inform here. It's just, you know, it is a big phone, but what i prefer about it, and some of the items that do not love about it, prove to be just lots of little things. We should, we should always just get into it, let's get into it.

So not every phone review is about spec. Some phones have quite mediocre specs. Like here's the Pixel 4A, it is not a mediocre spec, but it is a specialized phone. But this can be the NoteUltra with a capital U. and then yeah, people going for this phone are gonna care about the spec. So let's just discuss some key ones right at the highest. It has a 6.9-inch quad HD plus display that supports HDR 10 plus, it's in fact OLED and has 120 Hertz refresh rate, and a primary for Samsung, itis a variable refresh rate.

Samsung says that it can go all the way down to 10 Hertz if nothing is moving on the screen, which is meant to save lots of battery life. Besides the refresh rate, the screen is great. I like the colorsI really like the pixel density. I do not even mind how it curves around on the perimeters, but I'm gonna speak about the refresh rate again. It really matters on a phone of this class and it really does look great. you'll feel it just everywhere the software package.

Now, one thing you ought to know is you cannot have the max refresh rate at 120 and find the utmost resolution on the screen, but i do not care. Give me the refresh rate. it's 12 gigs of RAM, which, to me, is enough for an Android phone to try and do a bunch of multitasking. And the $1,300 version of this phone has 128 gigs of storage, which, really Samsung? i do know that it's expandable with micro SD, but it can't spring for256 at this price point? Come on. Anyway, the 512-gig version costs an additional 150 bucks on top of that.

The processor during this is that the Snapdragon 865 Plus, and after all, it supports both millimeter-wave and sub-6 versions of 5G. Because Samsung wants U.S. carriers to really care about this phone. U.S. carriers only care about 5G, so it's got 5G. Ah, 5G rent over. It's got a 4500-milliampere battery, and I am getting five, sometimes six hours of screen time with pretty heavy use of this thing. Overnight on standby, it's draining like maybe 10%. So I believe battery life is great. I mean, it should be, this is, as I've said, an enormous phone. It's got in-screen ultrasonic fingerprint sensor, wireless charging, reverse wireless charging, stereo speakers IP 16, water resistance, Bluetooth 5, this S pen here, this huge camera bump here.

Actually, we're gonna save the camera on the S Pen for later 'cause lots were occurring there, but anyway, you get the purpose. The specs on this phone are great. This phone is fast and also the design of this phone, well, it's totally noting and it's extremely ultra heat, but I mean, these Galaxy Notes are big, but they're also like properly squared off at the corners here. they create you think that of a slab, and that i think that's actually good for what a note is that it looks like a slab. There's this new matte finish on the rear that I believe looks better than glossy, but it is also just a touch bit more slippery actually, a minimum of it feels that thanks to me.

Now for this thing being ultra E, what does ultra E mean? Well, here's what i feel meaning. This thing right here, this camera bump, it is a mesa. it's an enormous flat outcropping arising spontaneously out of the vast desert, that's the rear of this phone. It's big and it's squared off. In fact, it's even bigger than the large camera bump on the Galaxy S20 Ultra. So what does one get out of this bump?

We're gonna go from easy to speak near to complicated after we discuss the numerous cameras on the Note 20 Ultra. First is that the ultra-wide-angle camera which one's simple, it is a 12-megapixel sensor and also the photos that initiate of it are okay but not stunning, which is reasonably par for the course for ultra-wide cameras. Then there's the selfie camera, which is simply 10 megapixels.

And what's happening here, Samsung? I've got turned off every face filter option that I could find, and it's still painting bad makeup everywhere my face. I literally seemed like a ham during this photo. I do know that there is a decent camera inside this phone here somewhere, might be so try-hard about doing all this face smoothing with it. Telephoto. There's excellent news for the camera lensit's a 12-megapixel sensor and it uses a periscope to increase the range so it can do 5x optical zoom and up to 50x space zoom digitally.
Now it's interesting is that is a smaller megapixel count and a smaller zoom than what it is on the Galaxy S20 Ultra. And you know what? Good, even at 50x on this thing, things don't look great, but they still look better than they did at 100x on other phones. It's still kind of a party trick once you get over 10x or 15x. But you know what's great? Having a photo that zoomed in 10 or 15 times that I would actually be willing to post somewhere.

I like the zoom on this camera. Okay, so the main camera on here is your standard wide-angle lens, but it has Samsung's 108megapixel sensor behind it. Now, usually, those pixels get combined or binned into just a 12-megapixel image, but you can take a 108-megapixel sensor image full-size thing if you want. And you know what, this is the juice right here. Samsung's whole deal with the ultra phones is it wants to take this big 108-megapixel sensor and do cool stuff with it. It is how Samsung wants to separate itself out from Google and Apple in the photography department.

Now, what it tried to try and do before with the Galaxy S20 Ultra, that did not go so hot because this sensor just couldn't focus fast enough. and that I am happy to mention that on the Note 20 Ultra, that problem has been fixed with a laser. It's using lasers for autofocusing, and that i haven't had an issue with focusing speed the least bit. I just want to mention that using this camera system here is that the blast. you have got numerous options, but they're all quite approachable, even in Pro mode, it quite approachable. And as long as you're in good light, you'll be able to just mess with all of them and find particular results such as you can shoot video in 8K if you wish to.

I don't think you must, but you totally can. But what you'll be able to also neutralize the professional camera mode could be a mess with the microphones. you'll be able to use the front-facing mic, the rear-facing mic, an Omni mic that listens everywhere, a Bluetooth microphone like in your earbuds or whatever, or a USB microphone. And typically I'm not the type of person who thinks that shooting "Pro" video on a phone makes plenty of sense, but it's actually setting out to make more sense to me here. they merely up the standard a bit bit, catch up with an iPhone 11 Pro, you may do some really interesting things with this thing. Oh yeah, picture quality. we must always speak about the photographs that commence of the thing.

Note 20 remains an interval behind the Google Pixel 4or the Apple iPhone 11 Pro. a part of that's just the color balance that Samsung likes. and that we can conform to disagree on color balance, but I just can't get on board with over-sharpening and over smoothing that Samsung tends to try to to. Now, interestingly, sometimes that works in Note 20's favor. So with night mode, I actually prefer the Note 20's photos to the Pixel 4's photos, because everything just looks a bit smoother within the dark in an exceedingly way that feels actually reasonably natural.

So usually discuss the cameras is just like the most interesting differentiated thing on a high-end smartphone, but with the Note 20, that'snot actually the case. the most reason to induce a note really is that the S pen. and that i think that Samsung has done something really special with it this year. Now i'm not talking about the waggy air gestures that you just can do to manage your phone from far. I'm not talking about the very fact that the stylus is finally on the left-hand side of the phone, so lefties get a year where they feel special rather than righties always getting the year.

I'm also not talking about the improved latency when you're writing on the screen, although I need to say that basically is noticeable, it really does feel dedicated to jotting down on the screen, nope, I'm talking about something else and can't believe I'm gonna say this, but I'm talking about Samsung's Notes app. it would be the most effective Notes app that you simply can get on a phone. Yes, I just said that. But look, Samsung's Notes app already did stuff that Apple Notes is simply catching up to and Microsoft's OneNoteon mobile can't make out all, like allow you to highlight your handwriting so copy the plain text.

It also allows you to export to docs or like now you'll be able to export to PowerPoint. it's really, really expert handwriting recognition, even on my terrible handwriting, and God, I like the software that it's carry on coming, it can realign your handwriting so it's nicer straight down on a page. It seems dumb but it really does matter after you attempt to come to them later. It can natively annotate PDFs finally, but still, Samsung also adds a folder organization this year if you care that.

It can do the thing where it records audio while you are taking notes, then afterward you'll be able to look over your notes again, tap on the spot where you jot something down and you'll be able to hear what the phone recorded. that's great for interviews or for lectures or whatever. I mean at nowthe sole thing I don like about Samsung notes is that it's Samsung. That's a very mean thing to mention. What I mean is that its really, dedicated on the note and everywhere else, ugh. Did you recognize that there is a PC version of Samsung Notes? I just learned that because now they've added instant syncing for Notes there, so that's helpful.

But the really big deals shortly this year, they go to feature the choice to integrate with Microsoft OneNote. Now it's only export from Samsung Notes to OneNote, but what meaning is all of the work that you simply put into taking a bunch of notes during this thing won't be stuck on this thing or the subsequent thing, you'll be able to actually buy a distinct phone someday and just use Microsoft OneNote. you may not be hanging with me on this one.

You might not believe that Samsung Notes is great, but I promise you it's great. But whether or not it's great, it doesn't suggest that you just can buy this phone to urge Samsung Notes, but you recognize what, credit where due. and really speaking of OneNote and Microsoft, there are a bunch of integrations coming, reminders and tasks will sync both ways to Outlook, you're gonna be ready to run multiple Android apps without delay on your Windows PC, and in fact, Samsung and Microsoft are touting the note as this great Xbox Game PassUltimate phone and yeah, playing Xbox games on a comparatively huge phone screen is pretty great, also.

Thus, all things considered, that, no doubt, Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, I believe it's quite acceptable, yet the things that make it great are the entirety of the seemingly insignificant details like Samsung Notes, better low light photography, every one of those amplifier alternatives when shooting video, the variable invigorate rate, variable revive rate improving battery life, no unique mark smears on the back, the low dormancy on the pointer. They're all extremely pleasant, yet none of them are motivated to go out and purchase this telephone. In the event that you have a Note 10 or even a Note 9, I truly don't figure you should update. You know, one reason that individuals purchase a Note telephone isn't the pointer is on the grounds that it's an overly decent sort of conspicuous telephone.

In any case, this is anything but a showy update, it's more similar to a spec knock, knock, it's more similar to a spec knock throughout the most recent year, yet that despite everything makes it extraordinary compared to other top-level Android telephones that you can purchase at the present time. What's more, that, that is not an easily overlooked detail.

Tell me what you think about the Note 20 Ultra down the stairs in the remarks. It is safe to say that you are hanging tight for the Fold or perhaps you need to get an OnePlus? Discussion about that down there.

 That's what they're called. Not the Buds Live, the Beans. They're headphones, we call them Beans.