now that the samsung galaxy s21 ultra is
finally available
how does it compare to last year's
samsung galaxy s20 ultra
should you save some money and go for
the s20 ultra instead
and is it worth upgrading from the s20
ultra to the s21 ultra
what's up guys saf here on supersaf tv
and we'll be trying to answer all of
these things in this video
by putting all the key differences side
by side
supersaf style so the first thing i want
to say is that pretty much everything
that i criticized on the
s20 ultra last year has been improved
on the s21 ultra it's almost like
somebody from samsung
was watching my review and going through
all of the points one by one i'm
kidding obviously lots of people also
had a lot of feedback
on the s20 ultra but i'm really happy to
see a lot of these things have been
implemented
but there are actually a few things
missing on the s21 ultra
that we have on the s20 ultra now the
first thing i want to look at
is the overall design i've said before
that the s20 ultra
does look a little bit bland it's
available in this gray or black and then
there was a white later on
but it's pretty flat and plain nothing
really that stands out
the s21 ultra in my opinion looks really
really good
i really like the updated camera module
which now blends into the side there's
really nothing else out there that looks
like
this and samsung has gone for a matte
finish on the back this year compared to
the glossy finish that we had
last year the glossy finish attracts
lots of fingerprints
the matte finish just looks sleeker in
my opinion i absolutely love this
phantom black there's also
a phantom silver version available and
there's additional colors
exclusively available from samsung as
well so there's really something for
everybody
we do have ip68 water and dust
resistance on both devices
and they are roughly about the same size
the s21 ultra does weigh a little bit
more but it is a little bit smaller
overall
one of the reasons for that is because
it's got a slightly smaller 6.8 inch
display versus the 6.9 inches
on the s20 ultra and we've got samsung's
infinity old design
with the punch out on small bezels the
bezels i would say
are roughly about the same on both
devices now the displays
do share a lot of similarities we do
have dynamic amoled technology
with a quad hd resolution on up to a 120
hertz refresh rate however there's lots
of improvements
on the s21 ultra firstly the s20 ultra
although you can have up to 120 hertz
when you are at 120 hertz you can only
be at
full hd resolution on the s21
ultra you can have the maximum sharpness
with the maximum smoothness
i'm totally copyrighting that line one
of the reasons why samsung's been able
to implement this on the
s21 ultra is because it's got an ltpo
display
that supports an adaptive refresh rate
you can go all the way down to
10 hertz and all the way up to 120 hertz
depending on what you're viewing on
screen so right now the screen is
completely static there is no need
for it to be 120 hertz this really helps
towards saving battery life now this is
newer technology which is not available
on the s20 ultra the s21 ultra also has
a brighter display i believe this is the
brightest
smartphone display out there if you're
somebody like me who has sunglasses a
lot
and uses your smartphone outdoors you're
really going to appreciate this
and the s21 ultra also has gorilla glass
victors we've got gorilla glass 6 on the
s20
ultra gorilla glass victus is just a lot
more durable
i'm not somebody who does drop tests but
we have seen some drop tests of
the samsung galaxy note 20 ultra which
was the first device
with gorilla glass victors and it does
perform very very well now this is not
to say that the s20 ultra has a bad
display by any means it's actually a
very very good display
it's just that the s21 ultra is better
and i would
say it's actually the best display on
any smartphone right now now both
displays do have a slight curve on the
edges it's nothing too significant
and both devices also have an ultrasonic
in-display fingerprint scanner but the
samsung galaxy s21 ultra does have
qualcomm's latest
3d sonic sensor gen 2 we've got the gen
1 on the s20 ultra the gen 2 scanner
is around 77 larger and around 50
percent faster
now it's really difficult to show this
on camera but i have noticed
generally that there are less failures
on the s21 ultra
compared to the s20 ultra now let's move
on to the cameras and i'm pleased to say
that samsung has made
lots of improvements to the s21 ultra
cameras compared to telasius s20 ultra
so we've got ultrawide primary and
telephoto cameras
but on the s20 ultra we have a single
telephoto camera with four times optical
zoom
on the s21 ultra we have two optical
zoom cameras
one is at three times and the other is
at 10 times
we also have a laser autofocus sensor on
the s21 ultra
and this is something that we didn't
have on the s20 ultra
which did give some focusing problems
now granted samsung did introduce
lots of software updates to improve the
autofocus on the s20 ultra
however it was never absolutely perfect
the s21 ultra with its laser autofocus
sensor
completely solves any focusing issues
now let's take a look at some samples
firstly the ultrawide camera
i think both actually do a really good
job i wasn't too pleased with the s20
ultra ultra wide shots when it initially
came out
but again these have been improved with
software the s21 ultra
does have better dynamic range although
i have found in certain situations it
can really boost the shadows
which does result in some processing i'm
confident that samsung can improve
this with software updates but one of
the key things that we've got on the
ultra wide camera of the s21 ultra
is the fact that it's got dual pixel
autofocus and this allows it to refocus
for macro shots this is something that i
really like on the s21 ultra you can get
some
really cool looking shots with that
macro camera moving on to the primary
cameras we do have a 108 megapixel
camera on
both devices however the sensor on the
s21 ultra has been improved it's the
newer version
and in good light i think both actually
do a really good job overall
you can notice that the s21 ultra does
have better dynamic range but one area
where you will definitely notice the
difference is in low light take a look
at this example the s21 ultra
just giving you a much brighter sharper
and cleaner image now one of the issues
that you do face with a large
sensor size on a smartphone that i've
gone into length and many other videos
is that you do have a very small plane
of focus
and that means things can get out of
focus very quickly
especially if you are close up so take a
look at this picture the leaf looks
absolutely great we've got a nice
shallow depth of field but if you do
start looking towards the edges of the
leaf
then things are starting to get out of
focus on both devices
now samsung has actually listened once
again and given us an
option to solve this which is called
focus enhancer mode
so if you do get closer than around 30
centimeters to a subject
then this is automatically going to kick
in which uses the ultra wide camera to
keep more things in focus and as you can
see
it definitely does deliver now granted
the images won't look
as flattering as you have with the
shallow depth of field
but in certain situations it can be very
very useful
and you can switch it on and off as you
please now the s20 ultra actually has
great zoom however the fact that samsung
plastered
100x space zoom on the camera module
itself
really took away from how good the zoom
was at around
10 times which is generally what i would
use it for at maximum
again samsung has listened to us and
there is nothing like this
on the s21 ultra and if you take a look
at some examples
here you can see that when we are three
times on the s21 ultra and when we're
out four times on the
s20 ultra results are super crisp
we can go to 10 times and here you will
start noticing the advantage of the
optical zoom on the s21 ultra especially
in the areas of the grass
things are sharper the s20 ultra is
still doing very good but really when
you start noticing the differences
are at the more extreme zoom levels so
here is an example at 30 times
and the s21 ultra definitely giving you
a much cleaner result and then we can go
all the way
up to 100 times again the s21 ultra
because it
is using that 10 times optical zoom
is giving you much much more detail now
i've said this many times before and i'm
gonna say
yet again how many times are people
going to use 100 times
zoom not many yes if there's a sign that
you want to see in the distance
maybe you use it but generally speaking
the three times and the 10 times
are absolutely great and i'm glad that
samsung hasn't placed this all over the
camera module
so the attention doesn't actually go to
it the attention stays on the fact
that three times 10 times even up to 30
times is very very good for selfies
we've got a 40 megapixel camera on both
devices
although generally you will be shooting
at around 10 megapixels
and again samsung has listened i have
complained about this for many years
samsung devices tend to really brighten
up your face which i'm not a fan of
because it does make me look quite fair
i'm proud of my brown color well the s21
ultra
you can actually switch between natural
or bright selfies it gives you that
option
of course i selected natural and yes
skin tones are definitely
much more natural compared to what they
were on the s20 ultra
look at my skin there's definitely some
smoothing going on on the s20 ultra
even though everything is set off to
complete zero but
i have noticed that results on the
selfie camera of the
s21 ultra are a little bit soft you'll
notice in this example that the
s20 ultra does give you sharper results
also
although skin tones are better on the
s21 ultra if you look at my jacket
the color is more accurate on the s20
ultra
now these are things once again i'm
confident that samsung can improve
with software updates overall i'm very
very pleased
with the improvement samsung has brought
over to the s21 ultra compared to the
s20 ultra
let's now talk about video so we do have
8k
at up to 24 frames a second on both
devices
but the s21 ultra you can film at 4k
60 frames a second from all of the
cameras
on the s20 ultra you can only do 4k60
from either the primary camera or the
front-facing camera video quality is
actually really good on both
the s21 ultra does come with some new
software features so we do have
single take 2.0 where it will be taking
a lot of
videos and images from all the different
cameras and then compiling them
and we've also got directors view which
lets you preview the different lenses
when you are filming this is something
that you don't have on the s20 ultra
one of the reasons for that is the newer
internals on the s21 ultra
now let's talk about this we do have the
exynus versus qualcomm battle once
again depending on your region you will
be getting different versions of this so
the samsung galaxy s20 ultra either
comes with the qualcomm snapdragon 865
chipset
or samsung's xs990 now i've gone on
about this
in a lot of detail in my full review of
the s20 ultra which i will link in the
cards and in the description
but in a nutshell the qualcomm version
was just better in terms of performance
and battery life
compared to the exynos version with the
s21 ultra
you have either the qualcomm snapdragon
888
or the exynos 2100 now samsung has
actually bought lots of improvements to
the 2100
and in my usage so far it has been very
very fast
unfortunately i do not have the qualcomm
snapdragon 888 version of the s21 ultra
as yet
however it is on order and it will be
coming very soon and i will do more of
an extensive review of the s21 ultra
with both chipsets if you do want to see
that video first then be sure to
subscribe and hit that bell icon now the
s20 ultra although
the performance is pretty good overall
the s21 ultra
being the new device with the newer
internals is just going to be
better we're looking at around 25
improved cpu performance and around 35
improved gpu performance now in the
day-to-day you might not notice it
hugely
but one of the things i always say is
lifespan if you do get the s21 ultra
it's just going to last you that much
longer compared to the s20 ultra
and another thing to keep in mind as
well is software
right now both devices do have android
11
with one ui but the s21 ultra being the
newer device
will be getting software updates longer
compared to the s20 ultra another thing
that will go towards the improvement of
performance on the s21 ultra
is the fact that it's got ufs 3.1
storage versus ufs
3.0 storage and for storage options we
actually have
the same 128 256
as well as 512 gigabyte variants
available
but the s21 ultra
no longer has a micro sd card slot the
s20 ultra
does so you can expand the storage on
the s20 ultra
by quite a significant amount almost up
to 1.5 terabytes
if you do go for the 512 gigabyte
version this is something
you will not be able to do on the s21
ultra
and if a micro sd card is important to
you then obviously
this is going to be something that
you'll be very disappointed to hear
about the s21 ultra now let's move on to
the batteries so we actually have the
same size
batteries on both devices however the
s21 ultra being the newer device
does have the more efficient five
nanometer chipsets compared to that on
the s20 ultra
and i have found that overall i am
getting better battery life on the s21
ultra so far
i've only had it for just over a week so
there's a disclaimer
i will be covering my battery life usage
after using
the s21 ultra both variants for over a
month
so do watch out for that video both
devices have up to 15 watt
wireless charging and both also support
reverse
wireless charging wireless powershare
where you can
use these devices to charge others
wirelessly
however the s20 ultra does get a few
advantages here
firstly the s20 ultra does support
faster
wired charging up to 45 watts the s21
ultra
can only do up to 25 watts of wired
charging
also and i guess more importantly the
s20
ultra does come with a 25 watt charger
included
out of the box the s21 ultra this year
does not come with a charger included
unfortunately
i've gone on about this many many times
i think
it's something that a lot of people can
definitely get over
because of the likes of wireless
charging and other charges you may
already have
however the fact that samsung made fun
of apple
for not including a charger and doing
the same a few months later
i'm just not too keen on but anyway
moving on both devices do have stereo
speakers so we've got one speaker in the
earpiece and
one bottom firing they both sound very
very good
and let's talk about some of the
additional features
firstly the s21 ultra does come with
ultra
wideband technology which is going to
give it better connectivity
it's going to allow you to do things
like track down your s21 ultra even if
it doesn't have an internet connection
and also do things like using your s21
ultra as a touchless key
for your car we've also got hyper fast
wi-fi
6e on the s21 ultra which can give you
up to four times
faster wifi speeds now you will need a
compatible router to get up to those
speeds but this is something else that
you get on the s21 ultra now
one thing that you may not get on your
unit of your s21 ultra however
is mst support so msd allows your phone
to work with point of sale terminals
that only support
old-school magnetic stripe cards this is
something that we've got support for
across
all of the s20 ultra units but
some s21 ultra units do not have this
supported
now this is going to vary depending on
your region and if mst support
is important to you then i would
recommend speaking to your retailer
before making your purchase now one new
thing that we've got this year which
we've never had on a galaxy s
device before is s-pen support so you
can use an s-pen
with the s-21 ultra now this s-pen is
not included
like it is with the note series it is
something that you're going to have to
buy separately
and because there is really nowhere to
put the s-pen within the s-21 ultra
you will likely have to buy it with a
case unless you want to keep
losing your s pen now this is something
that i think is a great addition i'm
somebody who uses my s pen a lot and
having this feature
on the s21 ultra is definitely a nice to
have and
finally looking at the price so the s21
ultra is actually coming in at a lower
price
compared to what the s20 came in at last
year
a little bit cheaper here in the uk but
quite a bit cheaper
in the us now obviously because the s20
ultra has been
out for about a year the price has
dropped quite a bit i've just had a
quick look and at the point of this
video
it is going for around 800 pounds in the
uk on amazon
and around 950 dollars in the us i'll
leave some amazon links down below
so based on that let's try to answer the
question should you save some money and
go for the s20
ultra instead of the s21 ultra well in
my opinion
you should go for the s21 ultra
especially if you're going to be
pre-ordering because samsung is
currently including
the galaxy buzz pro as well as a galaxy
smart tag
those both together are worth around 250
pounds
making the s21 ultra a much more
compelling deal
but i guess if you are in a bit of a
budget and you're going to be getting an
even
better deal on the s20 ultra maybe
you're going to be picking it up second
hand then it is a very good device
overall
although i would also recommend possibly
checking out the note 20 ultra
which did bring lots of improvements and
if you've currently got the s20 ultra
should you upgrade to the s21 ultra well
that really comes down to you
if you're generally happy with the s20
ultra i'd recommend
maybe waiting until we've got the next
version out but if you do want the
improvements of the s21 ultra
and you think they will be worth it for
you then i can definitely recommend the
s21 ultra
it's an excellent smartphone overall i
want to go back to the fact that samsung
really did take the feedback on board
and brought us all of the improvements
that we asked for
that's what i think anyway what do you
guys think do drop me a comment below
and let me know your thoughts as i said
we will be doing lots more s21 ultra
coverage here on the channel
supersaf style if you do want to see all
of that first then be sure to subscribe
and hit that bell icon so you don't miss
any of it i hope you enjoyed this video
and found it useful if you did
then do it that thumbs up button for me
thanks for watching this is saf on
supersaf tv
and i'll see you next time
you