Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus review: Top-notch notch-less

Samsung doesn’t need to revolutionize the smartphone industry in 2018 — it needs to iterate on all the hard work it did with the Galaxy S8 line last year. But with the added pressure of the tenth-anniversary iPhone out on the market, Samsung isn’t just resting on its laurels.

The Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus bring both iterations on the Galaxy S8 design and some much-requested new features, but is the company’s focus in the right areas?

Samsung Galaxy S9 review notes: We’ve been using the Galaxy S9 Plus on Vodafone’s network in Barcelona, Spain for roughly a week and a half. Our review unit is running Android 8.0 Oreo, Samsung Experience version 9.0, and build number R16NW.G965U1UEU1ARB7 on the February 1, 2018 security patch. We’re holding off on adding review scores until we can put both the Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus through our full suite of tests, the results of which will be coming in a deep dive review in the near future.

Design

If you’re not careful, you might mistake the Galaxy S9 for an S8, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

The Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus were two of the prettiest phones to launch in 2017 (or, dare I say, ever), and the S9 refines the design even further. Both the S9 and S9 Plus feature Samsung’s now-signature curved glass panels on the front and back, separated by an aluminum frame. Those curved pieces of glass make the devices feel extremely comfortable to hold, almost like they cradle right into your palm. 

The curved edges on the front panel are less intense than on the Galaxy S8, which makes swiping in from the edges of the screen a bit easier.

The one big change in this year’s design is the location of the fingerprint sensor. The Galaxy S8 and Note 8‘s fingerprint sensors were in the worst place imaginable — to the right of the camera sensor. It was awkward and not at all well thought out. The sensor’s now where it should be, right under the camera in the middle, where your finger naturally falls when holding it.

All the buttons, ports, and slots are in the same places as the S8. The SIM tray is on the top, the power button is on the right, and the left side houses the volume key and dedicated Bixby button. On the bottom, you’ll find the USB Type-C port, 3.5 mm headphone jack (yes!), and a slightly redesigned bottom-firing speaker grille.

The Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus are slightly smaller overall than their predecessors. This is because Samsung shrunk the top and bottom bezels, making the S9 1.2 mm shorter than the S8, and the S9 Plus 1.4 mm shorter than the S8 Plus. Both new models are heavier though — the Galaxy S9 weighs 163 grams compared to the S8’s 155 grams. and the S9 Plus weighs in at 189 grams compared to the S8 Plus’ 173 grams. The differences in weight are actually pretty noticeable

Samsung gave us the Midnight Black model for review, but the S9 and S9 Plus also come in Coral Blue, Titanium Gray, and the all-new Lilac Purple, which has been a favorite of ours ever since Samsung announced these phones.

Whichever color you choose, be prepared for the Galaxy S9 to be an absolute fingerprint magnet, which is common with all-glass phones.

Fingerprints aren’t the only things you need to worry about. These phones are fragile. It didn’t take long for our review unit to get some scuffs on the display. The top layer of Gorilla Glass 5 is already wearing away, which is easy to see when the screen is off. This has happened to a few other of our other glass-on-glass Samsung devices in the past, too. As premium as they might be, they aren’t perfect.

These phones are fragile

The design may not be durable, but at least these phones are IP68-rated for dust and water resistance. This means they’ll be able to survive a dunk in fresh water at 1.5 meters for up to 30 minutes

Display

Samsung has had the best smartphone displays on the market for years, and the Galaxy S9 lineup is no exception. Both Super AMOLED panels offer deep blacks, vibrant colors, and superb viewing angles. Seriously — these displays are a joy to look at day in and day out, no matter what you’re doing.

Samsung has had the best smartphone displays on the market for years, and the Galaxy S9 lineup is no exception

Though the Infinity Display is a recurring feature of all Samsung flagships, the immersion aspect is a little dialed back because the left and right sides no longer bleed all the way to the edge. This minimizes the number of accidental palm presses users experience when reaching to the opposite edge of the phone’s screen.

The displays also get 15 percent brighter than those on the Galaxy S8 line. They’re so bright, in fact, that turning the brightness all the way up is way too intense for anything but outdoor viewing. Fortunately, they get very dim too, which makes them great for reading on your phone before bed.

The Galaxy S9 has a 5.8-inch, 18.5:9 aspect ratio display. The Galaxy S9 Plus comes with a bigger 6.2-inch screen. Both displays have a maximum resolution of Quad HD+ (2,960 x 1,440), though they are set at Full HD+ out of the box. They can also be downscaled to HD+ if you’d like to save some battery life.

Samsung’s wonderful always-on display makes a return this time, too. This continues to be one of the more useful always-on  display implementations out there. You can display the current time and home time if you’re traveling, as well as battery percentage, and all your notifications. Double-tapping a notification quickly opens it up too.

Performance

Samsung has gone the Apple route with its two smartphones, offering slightly higher-end specifications in the bigger model. The Galaxy S9 comes with 4 GB of RAM and the S9 Plus has 6 GB. It’s unfortunate to see this, as it feels like a way to make users spend more on the Galaxy S9 Plus just to get that extra boost in power, not because the device actually needs it.

Both devices are powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 SoC in the United States, and Samsung’s own Exynos 9810 elsewhere. We have a Snapdragon 845-powered unit, though we will certainly be covering the Exynos version soon.

It should come as no surprise that we encountered absolutely no slow-downs or stutters throughout our testing period. We’re positive the Galaxy S9 runs wonderfully as well, though we haven’t been able to spend a lot of time with it at time of writing.

Games like Tekken and Final Fantasy IX performed without any problems throughout our testing, though we had some issues getting Final Fantasy Omnia Opera to load on our review unit. We’re sure this will be remedied quite quickly, though.

Whichever model you get, you should be happy with how these phones perform.

Hardware

It wouldn’t be a Samsung device unless it packed in everything but the kitchen sink. Samsung gives users a hefty amount of on-board storage with 64 GB, which can be expanded via microSD up to an extra 400 GB.

That extra storage is great news for those who like to load up their devices with plenty of music and podcasts. If you’re not streaming audio over the S9’s Bluetooth 5 connection, you can plug in your favorite headphones to the 3.5 mm headphone jack. That’s right — though seemingly every other manufacturer is removing the headphone jack, Samsung has decided to keep it. After all, everyone still uses it. I, for one, am very happy about this decision.

Though seemingly every other manufacturer is removing the headphone jack, Samsung has decided to keep it

Samsung also included headphones in the box, unlike some companies. In this case, it included the same pair of AKG earbuds in the box as with the Galaxy S8, which is a nice bonus.

There’s also Dolby Atmos support built in, to provide a more immersive listening experience over wired audio.

If you’re not listening to music with headphones, you’ll be happy to hear Samsung is finally focusing on improving the quality of its speakers too. The S9 and S9 Plus still have a bottom-firing speaker, though it’s now accompanied by a front-firing speaker on the top of the device, above the display. These AKG-tuned dual speakers are 1.4-times louder than the speakers on the S8 line, which is a welcome improvement.

Samsung at least makes it super easy to charge the S9. Both devices are compatible with Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 2.0 standard through wired charging, which means it will take about 90 minutes to get from single digits to over 90 percent. The addition of fast wireless charging through WPC and PMA standards is also quite convenient too, though that is usually used when the phone is idle.

Finally, Intelligent Scan is the merging of two biometric features, Face Unlock and Iris Scanner. The S9 will automatically search for either your face or your iris when the phone is woken up. It isn’t an instantaneous unlock all the time though. Most of the time, the phone looks for a face, but might not get it because of an incorrect angle or something else, and then switches to infrared light for an iris scan. This takes time.

Multiple prompts appear at the top of the lock screen giving advice on how to achieve the unlock, but for the most part you just have to make sure the phone is pointed right at your face and you are looking right at the phone. Face Unlock is not easy for the phone to do in the dark, but infrared light can always find an eyeball. At night, this has definitely proven useful.

Camera

If there is one place Samsung really focused (no pun intended), it’s the camera. Samsung has improved its cameras a lot in the last few years, so it was interesting to see where it could possibly bring more innovation. As it turns out, there was plenty of room for improvement.

DON'T MISS

AR Emoji vs Animoji: The differences explained

Let’s start with the fun stuff — AR Emoji. Samsung’s take on the Apple Animoji is a self-customized avatar that can either be a caricature of oneself or a completely different thing altogether. 

AR Emoji are easy enough to make, no matter which camera is being used — let the camera detect the face and it will give you a starting template. The facial recognition is not perfect, but it probably was never meant to be. All AR Emoji face shapes are about the same so not everyone is going to get a picture-perfect version of themselves. Skin tone, hair style, and clothing can all be customized and the end result is saved in the camera app. Users can take pictures with their AR Emoji or even record video of the avatar’s face moving along with their own. Only the face is tracked, but it tries to move even the eyebrows correctly for more accurate expressions.

The rear camera is capable of 4K 60 fps video capture, which is nice for very fluid motion capture. Videos from the S9 Plus are detailed and helped along by optical image stabilization in the rear module. The camera is also capable of very high speed, 960 fps video capture at 720p. The lower resolution might not be ideal for smartphone filmmakers, but the result is still eye-catching. In those cases when the moment is tough to capture, the camera app also has an Auto mode that triggers the Super Slow Motion at, hopefully, the appropriate time.

Specs