The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is the South Korean electronics giant’s latest flagship smartphone. It comes with some eye-catching basic specs: there’s a huge 6.9-inch AMOLED display, a high-end Exynos 990 chipset (Snapdragon 865 in the USA), and a massive 5000mAh capacity battery to keep you shooting all day.

 

The S20 Ultra packs more photographic possibilities compared to its S20 and S20 Plus sister models, too, thanks to a quad-camera configuration that features an additional time-of-flight (ToF) depth sensor, a higher-resolution primary camera, and a longer focal length tele-camera.

 

The S20 Ultra’s primary camera offers an updated version of the 1/1.33-inch 108MP-resolution sensor that we saw on the Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro. The S20 Ultra now uses 3×3 pixel binning (instead of the 2×2 of the Xiaomi), combining 9 pixels into one “super-pixel” that results in a bigger effective pixel size of 2.4µm to help improve image quality in the 12MP image output. The primary sensor is coupled to a standard wide-angle 26mm-equivalent lens with f/1.8-aperture.

 

Samsung has also made some changes to the ultra-wide camera on the S20 Ultra compared to previous generations, although they’re slightly less dramatic than the primary sensor resolution and tele-camera upgrades. The new model now features a 13mm f/2.2-aperture lens and 12MP sensor, compared to the wider 12mm f/2.2 optic and higher-resolution 16MP sensor on the S10 Plus. The lower resolution ensures a bigger pixel size of 1.4µm on the latest model, and the 12MP resolution remains perfectly adequate for the majority of smartphone shooters.

 

 

Finally, the S20 Ultra’s rear quad-camera features an additional depth sensor. Activated in Portrait mode, the 0.3MP depth sensor uses ToF 3D technology to help improve subject segmentation when applying a bokeh effect.

 

The newly-designed sensor on the primary camera now enables 8K video capture on the S20 Ultra at 24 frames per second. While 24fps is the only frame rate available for 8K video, drop to 4K and you can capture videos at 30fps or 60fps. Frame rates of up to 960fps are available at 720p resolution. Video features also include Samsung’s HDR10+ video processing that promises improved dynamic range, color, and contrast. For stabilization, both gyroscope-enabled electronic image stabilization (EIS) and optical image stabilization (OIS) are activated in all of the S20 Ultra’s video formats.

 

SPECIFICATIONS

BODY    

• Dimensions: 166.9 x 76 x 8.8 mm (6.57 x 2.99 x 0.35 in)
• Weight: 0.2K g
• Build: Glass front (Gorilla Glass 6), glass back (Gorilla Glass 6), aluminum frame
• SIM: Single SIM (Nano-SIM and/or eSIM) or Hybrid Dual SIM (Nano-SIM, dual stand-by)

 

DISPLAY

• Type: Dynamic AMOLED 2X capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors
• Size: 6.9 inches, 114.0 cm2 (~89.9% screen-to-body ratio)
• Resolution: 1440 x 3200 pixels, 20:9 ratio (~511 ppi density)
• Protection: Corning Gorilla Glass 6
•  HDR10+
• Always-on display
• 120Hz@FHD/60Hz@QHD refresh rate

 

PLATFORM        

• OS: Android 10, One UI 2
• Chipset: Exynos 990 (7 nm+) – Global
• Qualcomm: SM8250 Snapdragon 865 (7 nm+) – USA
• CPU: Octa-core (2×2.73 GHz Mongoose M5 & 2×2.50 GHz Cortex-A76 & 4×2.0 GHz Cortex-) – Global
• Octa-core (1×2.84 GHz Kryo 585 & 3×2.42 GHz Kryo 585 & 4×1.8 GHz Kryo 585) – USA
• GPU: Mali-G77 MP11 – Global
• Adreno: 650 – USA

MEMORY           

• Internal: 128GB HDD + 12GB RAM

 

MAIN CAMERA

• Quad     108 MP, f/1.8, 26mm (wide), 1/1.33″, 0.8µm, PDAF, OIS
• 48 MP, f/3.5, 103mm (periscope telephoto), 1/2.0″, 0.8µm, PDAF, OIS, 4x optical zoom, 10x hybrid zoom
• 12 MP, f/2.2, 13mm (ultrawide), 1.4µm, Super Steady video
• 0.3 MP, TOF 3D, f/1.0, (depth)
• Features: LED flash, auto-HDR, panorama
• Video     4320p@24fps, 2160p@30/60fps, 1080p@30/60/240fps, 720p@960fps, HDR10+, dual-video rec., stereo sound rec., gyro-EIS & OIS

SELFIE CAMERA

• Dual: 40 MP, f/2.2, 26mm (wide), 0.7µm, PDAF
• Features: Dual video call, Auto-HDR
• Video: 2160p@30/60fps, 1080p@30fps

SOUND

• Loudspeaker: Yes, with stereo speakers
• 3.5mm jack: No
•  32-bit/384kHz audio

COMMS

• WLAN    Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax, dual-band, Wi-Fi Direct, hotspot
• Bluetooth: 5.0, A2DP, LE
• GPS: Yes, with A-GPS, GLONASS, BDS, GALILEO

NFC: Yes

• Radio: FM radio (Snapdragon model only; market/operator dependent)
• USB: 3.2, Type-C 1.0 reversible connector, USB On-The-Go
• FEATURES
• Sensors Fingerprint (under display, ultrasonic), accelerometer, gyro, proximity, compass, barometer

BATTERY                          

• Non-removable Li-Po 5000 mAh battery
• Charging: Fast charging 45W
• USB Power Delivery 3.0
• Fast Qi/PMA wireless charging 15W
• Power bank/Reverse wireless charging 9W