No one is ever a fan of price hikes, but it’s one of the biggest trends we saw in the latter half of the year. Recent flagship releases like the iPhone 15 Pro Max and Pixel 8 Pro saw their prices go up by $100 over their predecessors, so one could presume that Samsung could follow suit with its upcoming Galaxy S24 series.
However, that doesn’t appear to be the case — and that’s wonderful news to our ears.
The latest rumors point to potenitally good news for anyone wondering whether to buy something from the new Samsung Galaxy S24 series, which is tipped for an unveiling sometime in mid-January. Beyond pricing, there are also new rumors related to the display, cameras, and much more. This all makes for a compelling case, especially for the Galaxy S24 Ultra since it's replacing the Galaxy S23 Ultra — one of the most expensive phones released at the start of this year.
Everything’s starting to take shape for the Galaxy S24 series as we quickly get closer to its anticipated announcement in a month's time. Here’s what the latest rumors hint to.
Display brightness reaching 2,600 nits
Gone are the days of companies trying to cram as many pixels into phone displays. Instead, the focus has been on the brightness of these panels instead — and the iPhone 15 Pro Max and Pixel 8 Pro are proof of that with their substantially brighter outputs.
According to a Twitter tipster @AhmedQwaider888, the Galaxy S24 Ultra’s new Dynamic AMOLED display could achieve a peak brightness output of 2,600 nits, which is up from the previous speculation of 2,500 nits. That would place it in a great position to have one of the brightest screens, second only to what the recently announced OnePlus 12 is reportedly able to achieve.
These figures, however, are usually recorded under controlled circumstances. In our own testing, they’re usually lower — but nevertheless gives us an overall picture on how phone displays compare. Take for example the iPhone 15 Pro Max and Pixel 8 Pro, which both reached peak brightness outputs of 1,550 and 1,526 nits respectively.
Of course, the Galaxy S24 Ultra has an opportunity here with its 6.8-inch AMOLED display. It’ll come in handy when you need to see what’s on screen when it’s a bright, sunny day.
Upgraded camera features
A lot of the attention around the Galaxy S24 Ultra centers around its cameras. Previous rumors hint at a 5x zoom from its revamped telephoto camera, which would be down from the 10x zoom lens of the Galaxy S23 Ultra. Don’t let this potential ‘downgrade’ fool you because as we’ve seen in recent phones, like the iPhone 15 and OnePlus Open, new image processing techniques have yielded excellent telephoto results.
The same Twitter tipster claims upgraded camera features with the Galaxy S24 Ultra, such as the ability to perform a 5x zoom while recording in 8K resolution, improved optical image stabilization for nighttime and daytime photography, an option for 5x portrait zoom, and an AI objects-aware engine that would be available to all the cameras (including the front camera).
⭕️Exclusive Galaxy S24 Ultra💥200mp Main camera💥12mp Ultra-wide💥50mp💥10mp💥12mp front cam💥8K& 5x Zoom video 8K💥Portrait Zoom 5X💥Optical stabilizer is better at night&day 💥The pixel size is larger in 50mp💥Ai Objects aware engine: available in Front&Rear cameras pic.twitter.com/3WpIRp23LvDecember 12, 2023
We’re eager for the latter because the Galaxy S24 series is already tipped to focus heavily on AI-assisted features, much like what’s found on the Pixel 8 Pro. It’s unknown what AI-powered camera features we’ll end up seeing for the Galaxy S24 series, but the company has already teased its on-device generative AI called Samsung Gauss.
Prices could remain unchanged
And finally, the biggest rumor of them all — the Galaxy S24 prices could end up staying the same. Meaning, the Galaxy S24, Galaxy S24 Plus, and Galaxy S24 Ultra could remain at $799, $999, and $1,199 respectively, that Samsung charges for the equivalent S23 models. What’s interesting about this claim is the reason behind it.
While the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip is likely to power the Galaxy S24 series, Samsung is believed to also use Exynos 2400 variants in multiple regions — which could offset the phones' production costs. By using the Exynos 2400 in some Galaxy S24 phones, it would prevent Samsung from having to charge customers more for its upcoming flagship series.
There’s no indication yet as to which regions will get the Exynos 2400 variants, but we suspect the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for all the units slated for a North American release. There’s a lot riding on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 because it was developed with artificial intelligence in mind, so to have these new experiences available without upping the cost of the phones is fabulous.
Samsung would be making a serious statement here if this pricing rumor turns out to be true, particularly when the Ultra series have topped the list of the most expenses phones in the last few years.
