Samsung’s new flagship smartphone is a little bit better at everything, and that’s all I really need at this point.
With each new numbered iteration of a premium smartphone that arrives on the scene, there’s usually at least one big selling point that marketing departments will latch onto in order to make consumers want to upgrade their handset. Usually, it’s a radically updated camera with a suite of new photographic features. Other times, manufacturers will bring drastic improvements to display resolutions and refresh rates. However, that isn’t the case with Samsung’s newly announced Galaxy S22 Ultra. For the first time in recent memory, the South Korean electronics giant’s latest flagship doesn’t have a standout new feature. In fact, the S22 Ultra’s biggest selling point this time around seems to be that it isn’t really an S-series phone at all – at least not in the way we’ve come to define it in the past. Despite Samsung’s messaging on the matter, the S22 Ultra is essentially a Samsung Galaxy Note in everything but name. So while the S22 Ultra lacks a game-changing new feature for me to harp on about, as a long-time Note user who’s gotten his hands on the device, I’m here to say that it honestly doesn’t need one. It’s no secret that advancements on the traditional smartphone front have basically plateaued in the last few years, with manufacturers now looking for other ways to make users excited about buying phones again. Foldable devices like Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 3 and the rumored Google Pixel Fold are a direct result of this. Of course, foldable phones are still in their infancy and, for now at least, most people still want a tried and true smartphone with no moving parts. This is where the Galaxy S22 Ultra comes in. It’s a phone that isn’t looking to win awards for innovation – it simply wants to be the best possible Samsung smartphone it can be at this point in time, and by this metric, it absolutely succeeds.
