6 awesome Samsung Galaxy S24 features that will make your life easier

Like its sibling, the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, the Samsung Galaxy S24 is an iterative upgrade over the previous generation. The S24 continues a trend seen across much of Samsung’s hardware over the last several years. The company seems to have adopted an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it mentality” to hardware revisions.

It packs a handful of interesting new features. Whether they’re enough to warrant an upgrade comes down to when you purchased your current phone and how much you prioritize the new features in this year’s model. To help you decide, we broke out the top features of the vanilla Galaxy S24 and detailed how they work.

1 Get acquainted with Galaxy AI

The headline feature of Samsung’s new S line is its suite of AI features, which Samsung has dubbed Galaxy AI. The primary AI features are:

• Live Translate: Allows you and someone speaking another language to both speak in your native tongues and get on-the-fly translations.
• Note Assist: Leverages AI to improve the tone and legibility of your writing.
• Generative Edit: Assists in editing photos.
• Chat Assist: Translates messages and helps you with tone.

2 Enjoy your Samsung Galaxy S24’s subtly refreshed visual design

As we mentioned in our hands-on with the S24 and S24+, this is the closest to the iPhone that Samsung has come in terms of design. This is mainly due to the evenly spaced, uniform thickness bezel. The sides of the S24 are completely flat, unlike the slightly curved sides of the S23. The display increased in size from the S23 by a negligible 0.1 inches, making the S24’s screen 6.2 inches.

Unlike the larger Plus, which adopted a QHD+ screen, the S24 retains the full HD display from the previous generation. Whether this nod to Apple’s aesthetics is pleasing or repellent comes down to taste. While the design is different under close examination, it’s not a major departure from the previous generation.

3 Take note of snappy performance and longer battery life thanks to Snapdragon 8 Gen 3

US versions of the S24 with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 mobile platform. The Gen 3 SoC offers improved performance and power efficiency compared with the Galaxy S23’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. That said, Samsung’s newest flagship sports the same 8GB of LPDDR5X RAM as its predecessor. On the upside, Samsung has bumped battery capacity up to 4,000mAh from the S23’s 3,900.

4 Use Circle to Search to find anything on your screen

For the S24, Samsung partnered with Google to include a new Circle to Search feature. It allows you to use your finger to trace a circle around part of an image or video. Google then provides search results for whatever you circled. If it works as intended, Circle to Search is an easy way to identify everything from products to plants or find address information or reviews for businesses featured in videos.

5 Get the perfect photo with improved AI image processing and Instant Slo-mo

Though the cameras on the S24 are the same as those built into the S23, the silver lining is that the improved chipset should yield improved photo editing options. AI is also being deployed extensively here, from improved previews of photos and videos (aided by Super HDR) to intelligent editing in which AI will fill in blank areas left by moving photo elements or banish unwanted reflections.

AI can also automatically spot and suggest improvements to your photos and remaster pics from other sources. There’s also Instant Slo-mo, which lets you add a slow-motion effect to a video you’re watching at any time or permanently slow down parts of a video in the editor.

6 7 years of updates means there’s no rush to upgrade to the S25

Samsung increased the number of years of promised software updates significantly. Instead of the four years promised with the S23, the entire Samsung Galaxy S24 lineup will get software support for at least seven years after launch.

Samsung is embracing our AI future

Most of the noteworthy features tucked into the S24’s chassis are powered by AI, which is largely driven by the more capable processor. Even the improvements to photo quality don’t hinge on a better camera this time but on artificial intelligence’s ability to tweak and improve your photos. How you feel about AI and how much you value its role in your mobile devices will likely be a deciding factor in whether the S24 is a worthy upgrade.

One of the ripple effects of the S24’s launch and the inclusion of Circle to Search is that Samsung removed the ability to hide the gesture bar. We have a guide that shows how to hide the gesture bar even after the update.