Samsung has this time decided to bring their two models of the Galaxy S series with the Exyn5os model and only the Ultra model with the Qualcomm Snapdragon chip for select regions. The Galaxy S24+ starts at Rs. 99,999 while the S24 starts at Rs. 79,999 for the base model. Let’s try and see how these perform and whether they are worth their price tags over their predecessor or not.
Both the devices look and feel in the hand pretty similar to the S23+60 and S23, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The displays here are slightly bigger with the S24+ having a 6.7-inch display (over the 6.6-inch on the S23+), and the S24 has a 6.2-inch display (instead of the 6.1-inch on the S23). The phones have an aluminium armour frame that’s supposed to be more pressure-resistant than the S23 series. Unlike the S24 Ultra, which has sharp edges, both these devices have curved corners with the S24+ weighing 196 grams and the S24 at 167 grams and hardly any difference in their thickness (with the S24 being slightly thinner at 7.6mm).
Both devices have Corning’s Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on top of the display with matte finish glass at the back. They are grippy and comfortable to carry around, unsurprisingly more than the bulkier S24 Ultra.
The right side carries the volume buttons and then the Power/lock key near the middle, which I would have probably preferred to be the other way around in terms of placement of the Power/lock key on the regular S24. The left side is all left plain. The top locates the secondary mic and one outlet for loudspeakers; while the bottom has the dual SIM tray slot, USB type C port and another outlet for loudspeakers.
The displays on Samsung’s flagship devices have generally been some of the best in terms of sharpness, colour calibration and HDR output, and it seems to be the case with these two devices s well. The S24’s 6.2-inch full HD+ (1080x2340) Dynamic AMOLED appears to have a slightly cooler colour temperature than the S24+’s 6.7-inch quad HD+ (1440x3120) Dynamic AMOLED display. They are usable under direct sunlight without much trouble and have good viewing angles. The displays have dynamic refresh rates from 1 to 120Hz with the LTPO technology in place.
The S24 series has added HDR support for Instagram and you can clearly see the difference while uploading and viewing HDR photos on Instagram. One of the more talked-about changes with the S24 and S24+ is Samsung going with their Exynos 2400 chipset (up to 3.21Ghz deca core processor, Xclipse 940 GPU). This has been coupled with 8GB of LPDDR5X RAM on the S24 and 12GB on the S24+ base models.
You get 128GB UFS4.0 storage (also comes in 256 and 512GB) on the S24 base model while the S24+ has it as 256GB (also comes in 512GB). It runs on Android 14 with OneUI 6.1 running with the February security patch in place.
I found the phone to handle regular tasks without any issues. Regarding gaming, you can expect to play a heavy game like Genshin Impact at its highest settings without having to worry about any heating issues.
But when the phones's WiFi hotspot was turned on for about 45 minutes, they did heat up quite a bit -- something I didn’t see much on the S24 Ultra.
While call quality, Bluetooth, GPS and WiFi performance are top-notch, the 5G reception isn’t quite as good as the S24 Ultra or the OnePlus 12, both of which have a competing high-end Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset. This is really my only complaint with this Exynos chip, which otherwise performs really well and seems to have been much improved over its predecessors.
There’s another feature in the Gallery app that basically allows you to remove objects from your photos, for instance, you can remove somebody in the background of your own photo and it worked really well, including for photos taken with some other device.
Coming to the triple camera system – you get a 50 MP (f/1.8) main camera, a 10 MP (f/2.4) telephoto camera, and a 12 MP (f/2.2) ultra-wide camera – for both smartphones. The phones take detailed and punchy shots and the last software update seems to have improved the shutter lag, which is especially useful when taking photos of kids or pets. Taking shots in low light can require a bit of fiddling around with the camera app, which is pretty snappy and feature-rich to begin with.
You can also shoot in RAW format for a more in-depth editing option, or HEIF for a lower size than JPEG generally. For videos, you can shoot 8K videos at 30FPS and 4K videos at 30 and 60FPS. The camera seems to have better output under low light in super-steady mode for videos.
The front-facing 12MP (f/2.2) camera generally takes detailed and well-stitched shots, though at times overexposing the subject, but not always, definitely good enough for your social media and video calling. The S24+ is powered by a 4,900 mAh battery unit while the S24 gets 4,000 mAh, with the S24+ I rarely had to charge it again on the same day, leaving about 15% after a medium to heavy day of usage.
With the S24, it used to be much less and on a heavy day, the S24 required to be charged again. The S24+ charged from 1% to full in about 1.5 hours, while this took 80 minutes or so for the S24. Both phones support up to 25 watts (power delivery) of charging, and it’s worth noting, that there’s no charger included in the box.
All in all, the S24+ and S24, despite their 7 years of promised OS updates, show that the S23+ and S23 (five years of updates from the launch time) are still very much capable and the jump isn’t that huge. If you’re getting a good deal on either the S23+ or S23 (depending on your size preference, mainly), you might want to consider those. But for those looking for the latest from Samsung in these price segments, other than Exynos 2400’s network quality issue, the S24+ and S24 do not disappoint.
