We always assume that “Ultra” means better. But what if I told you that that is not always the case? Because I switched from this Galaxy S25 Ultra to the regular Galaxy S25, expecting a downgrade.
But instead, I was very surprised. Many of the biggest flagship features? Still here. But there’s one thing that almost made me switch back, so let me show you.
Unboxing
Since this is a flagship phone, we get the flagship unboxing experience as well: a slim box with a charging cable and the phone. So, yes, nothing’s new here.
Design
But what’s new is this particular color. The reason why I took a while to review this particular Galaxy S25 is because I purchased this exclusive online version, which is the Coralred. The color was nice and fresh, and I love how you can see the colors of the frame in front too.
Then, speaking of “nothing” earlier, this “nothing” can also be felt because when you pick this up, it feels wrong. So, Samsung’s playing Jenga with physics because this is just 162g, which is 5g lighter than last year’s S24. For context, that’s like removing a paper clip.
But somehow, it feels so much lighter. I’ve been using this Ultra, which is at 218g, so this feels like when you lift up a bag and realize that you left your laptop at home because how can a smartphone be this powerful and be this light? Well, we’ll come into the performance in a minute.
But other than that, the camera rings are similar to the Galaxy S25 Ultra, and because it has the same placement, you can also expect this to wobble if you type it on the surface. So, yes, overall, it was the same because the prominent change was last year’s S24 Ultra.
But right now, the S25 Ultra has been very close to the baseline model when it comes to the build quality, the boxy shape, and the overall design, making the entire S25 series look like they were made for each other, making the whole S25 series lineup way more streamlined. So, making the change didn’t feel like a downgrade of sorts; it’s more of a refreshing new feeling.
Display
But what about the downgrade of the size of the display? This has a 6.2-inch Adaptive 1 to 120Hz, FHD+ Dynamic AMOLED display with 416 PPI. So, the display is definitely sharp considering the size of the screen.
The Galaxy S25 has 2,600 nits of peak brightness, which is brighter than flagship smartphones like the iPhone 16. But of course, lower than flagships like the vivo X200 Pro or even the OPPO Find X8 Pro, which is at a whopping 4,500 nits, or even the Pixel 9 Pro XL, which is at 3,000 nits.
But remember that this only matters if you’re under harsh sunlight during the whole entire time. So, if you love to suntan 24 hours, then maybe you can really feel the difference from your eyes. But for me, 2,500 nits was plenty bright for me.
But when you compare it with this Galaxy S25 Ultra, you will definitely feel like you miss this bigger display. While on paper, the resolution and the pixel density on this is bigger than the Galaxy S25, but honestly, it didn’t make a huge difference once again, even with the differences of the screen to body ratio.
So, yes, of course, I did miss the bigger screen. I would be lying to say that I did not, as that is to be expected since it is a smaller size phone. But as for screen quality, I liked it over here on the Galaxy S25 because the colors were punchy but at the same time retaining the deeper blacks very well. With fantastic color accuracy as it had true life colors. And this “trueness”, if that is even a word, can also be seen in the photos as well.
Cameras
There are differences in the main camera’s hardware, where this is a 50MP instead of a 200MP on the Ultra.
But if you take the same shot side by side for the ultrawide lens, even at a lower 12MP compared to the new 50MP on the Ultra, the overall image quality is the same, where you would only see a tiny difference on the texture of the bridge in the middle of this particular photo, but if you only zoom in close. So, yeah, overall, it does look like the dynamic range looks the same.
Then, as for zoom, obviously the Ultra can zoom so much further than the baseline S25.
But if you zoom until 10x zoom, you can only see a significant detail of change, where you can see that on the Ultra you have more details.
But if you zoom up to only 3x zoom, it is safe to say that both had the same exact quality, as seen in these photos.
Then, looking at the portrait mode side by side on objects like this particular flower, it is slightly better on the Ultra only for the edge detection. Other than that, it is equally good.
But the 1x portrait for humans was exactly the same, so was the 2x portrait.
But the 3x portrait was a bit brighter on the security guard’s jacket. This is not a big deal as you can always adjust this later if you want to.
Since both had the same selfie camera, both performed similarly as well.
Video Recording
[Check out my YouTube video for sample video footage]
Then, video recording remains the same, up to 8K 30fps, also on this baseline S25. It was nice that there was no sort of a compromise for this base model, which a lot of other smartphone makers tend to do. So, you can expect both the 8K and the 4K video to perform equally as well.
Nightography
Then, as for the nighttime shots, the ultrawide, the main, and the zoom up to 3x were the same, where you would only, once again, see a difference for the 10x zoom just being better on the Ultra.
Then, the same could be said for the nighttime selfie photos as well.
However, when it comes to recording videos at night, you will see some grain in the footage for this S25 on the 8K video recording. [sample footage on YouTube video]
So, yes, I believe here is where you can really see how well the S25 Ultra does the best over here since they have improved the overall Nightography when it comes to video. But yes, the night video glare on the lenses is still present on both.
So, yeah, based on that, although you get a more versatile periscope lens on the Ultra, if you don’t really use that, the S25 still did an amazing job for a base model phone like this.
Software
As a flagship Samsung, this packs everything the same as the Ultra. Speaking of the Samsung S25 Ultra, if you haven’t seen that video, check that video over here.
We have gone through everything new on the One UI 7, as this also ships with that, with 7 years of major OS updates and 7 years of security updates. So, it is obviously the same as the elder brother (or sister) on the S25 Ultra.
And yes, 7 years is a lot, guys, because that’s longer than most people keeping their relationships. So, yeah, if you’re looking for something long-term, this phone could be your best bet, other than the Ultra of course.
I had no issues on the software front on the Ultra, and the same could be said for this S25. So, there’s definitely no complaints over here. So, yes, overall, a very good experience from a software perspective, and it has always been the same, especially for One UI 7.
Battery
While the software experience did feel like magic, what really helps is also saving battery as well. This battery capacity is 1,000 mAh lower at 4,000 mAh of battery instead of 5,000 mAh on the S25 Ultra.
And while I did have some amazing battery on the S25 Ultra at close to 8 hours plus of screen on time, I was getting close to 5 to 6 hours of screen on time on this S25, which to me was really great, especially for a very small size phone compared to the S25 Ultra of course.
Then, charging speeds are lower though at 25W wired, but the wireless charging is the same at 15W, and there’s also reverse wireless charging up to 4.5W as well. So, that is available for both.
To be honest, I expected Samsung to bring the new Silicon Carbon battery technology, which takes less space and packs more battery, just like how vivo did with their X200 Pro Mini, which has a whopping 5,700 mAh of battery with 90W of wired charging, and it is at 6.3 inch only.
But I guess Samsung is just playing it safe by saying, “Don’t fix it if it’s not broken,” right? Because most people buying this wouldn’t really care so much of the comparison of the charging speed, as they just want a phone that could last more years because fast charging does indeed heats up the battery.
And considering this phone’s smaller size factor, it has less space to dissipate heat. And speaking of heat, let me tell you if this phone does overheat when you play heavy games for long periods.
Performance & Gaming
Next, what’s lovely is that this also comes with a Snapdragon 8 Elite For Galaxy with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, which is the same as my Ultra variant.
So, to counter that, Samsung has improved the vapor chamber cooling by 15%, which might not seem like a big leap, but if you start adding a more powerful chipset, then yes, the 15% bigger chamber does make a huge difference because this definitely makes gaming a huge difference when it comes to overheating.
Based on my gaming test on Genshin Impact, there’s no overheating at all. So, yes, this was also the same as the S25 Ultra, where the S25 Ultra performed the best at 60 fps with motion blur set to Extreme.
Conclusion
I thought I would really miss this Ultra as much as I really love it. But after using this S25, I realized that it’s not just about having more features; it is about using the ones that actually matter.
Check out my full video review of the S25 Ultra if you haven’t seen it, over here.
🛒 Get the Samsung Galaxy S25 at the link below:-
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