Samsung Galaxy S25 series barely makes a case for itself

Samsung’s flashy Unpacked event, earlier today, kicked off with chatter about AI, coming straight from its mobile business chief. Throughout the event, AI was a recurring theme, hijacking the talk away from exciting hardware innovation.

One of my colleagues even joked about not knowing the phone’s screen size despite the event entering its latter half. It was merely a sign of certain unsavory things to come, along with copious amounts of Apple “inspirations.”

And now that I’ve seen the starting price of the phones, which start at roughly $1,000 and go up to $1,920 in my home market, I understood why the focus was less on hardware, and more on AI.

Good AI, not unique AI

There certainly isn’t enough substance to pore over each aspect of the three phones. There are simply not enough upgrades to talk about, at all. And Samsung knows it. But here is the worse part. Even the Galaxy AI innovations Samsung talked about, well, they aren’t truly “Galaxy innovations,” if at all. The best specimen of this non-exclusivity came as Unpacked was in progress.

Google announced that Gemini Live is going multi-modal, which means it will make sense of pictures, YouTube videos, and files. This feature is not limited to the Galaxy S25. The Galaxy S24 series will also get the same upgrade. And so will Google’s Pixel 9 series smartphones.

“We’ll expand to more Android devices in the coming weeks,” says Google. The other upgrade — support for multiple app extensions in the same command — will even make it to the iPhone app and the Gemini desktop client. This type of coattail surfing is the name of the game for the Galaxy S25.

Personal data engine, which aims to keep the bulk of AI processing local to the device, is a desirable trait. Apple does it, too, with the Apple Intelligence. And I am fairly sure when it comes to privacy and safety, any smartphone shopper will pick a Galaxy over an iPhone.

Writing Assist on the Galaxy S25 series will let you pull off the same set of tricks as… wait for it… Writing Tools on the iPhone. And iPad. And the Mac.

Circle to Search can now identify songs. Well, Google Assistant has had that feature for a while now. And so has the iPhone, thanks to its Shazam integration.

The Galaxy AI’s stack will be able to read the on-screen content and have conversations about it. Siri already does that courtesy of Apple Intelligence, and so does Gemini on other phones.

Features like AI Select look neat in action, but they don’t stray too far off from what Apple’s Visual Intelligence stack is trying to accomplish.

Drawing Assist can turn your rough sketches into cool pictures, thanks to generative AI. That facility is already available on the iPads under the Magic Wand label, powered by OpenAI’s stack.

The Now Bar and Now Brief systems are neat, but they don’t stray too far off from the Live Activities system on iPhones. Plus, uttering the magic words “Hey Google, catch me up on today’s schedule” will do that just fine on your non-Galaxy phone, as well. You can see the problem here. There are AI features in the Galaxy S25, but they don’t move the needle.

Upgrades. Um, what?

I have already written a few choice words about Samsung’s lazy design work. Unfortunately, the streak continues with the Galaxy S25. That’s not the most disappointing element, though.

The Galaxy S25 and its Plus version only switch to a new Qualcomm silicon, and the niceties that come with it, alongside a jump in RAM figures to 12GB, up from 8GB. The storage capacity is still 128GB for the base model. The nearest Samsung store is selling that version to me for a staggering $930. The folks in the U.S. have it easier at $800, thankfully.

The camera hardware remains identical. A measly 10-megapixel telephoto camera with a lowly 3x optical zoom on the $1,000 Galaxy S25 Plus? Come on, Samsung! Even Apple is offering better value than that, which in itself is an amazingly bad precedent when it comes to getting the most value out of your smartphone splurge.

The OnePlus 13, at $900, offers a fantastic trio of 50-megapixel sensors with more advanced zoom optics. It does a better job at the design and a whole bunch of other aspects, too.

Let’s talk about the battery, which is again stagnant from the innovation perspective. Silicon carbide batteries that offer better density, higher capacity, and increased longevity? Not in Samsung’s house. No, Sir! The Galaxy S25 will offer you a 4,000mAh battery, with 25W wired charging. There is no native Qi 2 wireless charging support. No magnets inside, like Apple’s MagSafe. Also, you don’t get the charger in the box if you wanted a little extra sand in your face.

The Galaxy S25 Plus is a saving grace, as it reaches 45W wired charging. For comparison, the OnePlus 13 offers 100W wired and 50W wireless charging support, tagging alongside a $100 worth of lighter hit on your wallet, and a charger in the box.

The display stack remains unchanged, as well. Yes, a 120Hz OLED screen is not a bad deal, but that perk has now trickled down to phones that cost half as much.

Those are the fundamental aspects that define the mettle of a phone. Not only is Samsung dealing us a poor no-upgrade situation with the Galaxy S25 series, but also serving a poor competitive picture.

Let’s talk about the Galaxy S25 Ultra, a bit. The stylus is here to say, but the Bluetooth-driven gesture support is gone. The battery situation remains identical to its predecessor, and equally laggard when it comes to charging capabilities.

In the camera department, this $1,300 phone jumps to a 50-megapixel ultrawide camera, but the rest of the hardware remains the same. As far as capabilities go, Apple is once again the inspiration.

Say hello to Galaxy Log, which arrives nearly two generations late (by the iPhone calendar) to challenge… Apple LOG. Just like Apple, Samsung also paraded a filmmaker’s work to showcase the magic of Log capture. The company conveniently omitted just how complex color-grading can be, on pricey editing software, no less.

Audio Magic Eraser is already there on Pixel phones, but Samsung’s implementation doesn’t stray too far from the objective of Audio Mixing on the iPhone 16 Pro. There is a tad more specificity to Samsung’s approach, but nothing too original.

Making others look good

Overall, I am finding it really, really hard to buy into the Galaxy S25 series. Even going by the sticker price for the U.S. market, there is little innovation to see here.

Samsung is, in fact, on the losing end against the ambitious Chinese brands on one end, and Apple’s terrific reputation (and hype-driven execution) on the other end. There is little breathing space for mediocrity in a year that is about to see some fantastic developments in the smartphone segment. Samsung is not close to any of them.

Instead, it’s conveniently hawking a trio of phones that will have any sharp buyer asking how they stand out from the competition. For bargain hunters, there is hardly any practical reason to look past the previous year’s line-up, which is cheaper, and nearly as competitive.

As for me, well, I am not splurging a minimum$1,000 on a phone that offers nothing worth getting excited about on its own unique merit.

Hopefully, the upcoming Galaxy Edge is exciting enough, but I am more cautious than optimistic about that ever happening.