Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra vs Galaxy S21 Ultra: all reported differences

Moving on to the front, the other big difference between the S22 Ultra and S21 Ultra is the symmetry of the display bezels. Samsung is working on making its Galaxies truly “all-screen” by shaving off the bezel even more than what we have on the Galaxy S21 series, whose bottom bezel is vanishingly thin already, compared to the competition. The project is called Border Reduction Structure (BRS) internally, and Korean media confirmed it will be deployed as soon as the S22 series. This has reportedly allowed Samsung to change the aspect ratio from tall 20:9 in S21 Ultra to a slightly shorter and wider 19.3:9 in the S22 Ultra. 

The tradeoff is an added single-hand usage S22 Ultra discomfort for keeping the battery size and adding a built-in stylus, but we’d gladly have it, as the S21 Ultra is no less of a shovel to begin with. 

Those thinner S22 Ultra bezels and added width mean not only an improved screen-to-body ratio and larger true display area to doodle on with the S Pen, but have also allowed Samsung to keep the same 5000mAh battery pack, despite the addition of the S Pen silo. Overall, the S22 Ultra design wins over the S21 Ultra. 

S22 Ultra vs S21 Ultra display quality

1800 points of light, baby, and a larger canvas to doodle on!

With equally resolute QHD+ screens of the same 6.8″ size, the Galaxy S22 Ultra vs S21 Ultra display specs comparison may seem like a futile exercise. Samsung, however, has already fired up the new generation of LTPO OLED screen production, and the Galaxy S22 Ultra is said to be the first to benefit with a record peak display brightness of 1800 nits. Granted, such brightness levels will only be possible when you are watching HDR content in high ambient light settings, yet the same requirements are valid for the S21 Ultra’s panel which is able to reach “just” 1500 nits. 

A more granular refresh rate control down to the single hertz hence more efficient display power consumption may also be in store for the Galaxy S22 Ultra. Both screens have active digitizer layers that allow them to react to Samsung’s S Pen, with the big difference that on the S22 Ultra the stylus is always in the phone, while the S21 Ultra has it as a tack-on in a separate (and unwieldy) case. Another win for the S22 Ultra here.

S22 Ultra vs S21 Ultra camera

Raindrops, shmaindrops, how about a new sensor?

At first blush, the Galaxy S22 Ultra camera specs may sound the same as those on its predecessor – main 108MP camera, a 12MP ultrawide, and 10MP telephoto or periscope zoom sensors. Samsung, however, will reportedly equip the S22 Ultra with a next-gen 108MP main sensor that will now have a wider aperture, hence brighter lens on top of it. The new generation of the 108MP ISOCELL line in the S22 Ultra has reportedly allowed it to introduce better detail capture and low-light sensitivity. 

It’s not clear if Samsung will achieve this via some sort of what Apple calls Sensor Shift stabilization in the iPhone 13 models, or another technique, but it is obvious that Samsung will be going for Apple’s video capture crown with the S22 series, and the Ultra in particular.

Galaxy S22 Ultra vs Galaxy S21 Ultra specs and processor performance

While every tech giant and their chihuahua is on board the homebrew mobile chipset trend, Samsung has been playing this game for a while with varying success. Its latter days Exynos processor incarnations were marred by thermal and performance issues compared to their Qualcomm Snapdragon alternatives, chiefly on account of the stock ARM-Mali graphics it used in the package.

All of that is about to change with the next, Exynos 2200 iteration, which would reportedly by the first to bear the fruits of the Samsung-AMD labor under the form of an mRDNA graphics processor that is as frugal as it is powerful compared to its heretofore Mali counterparts in Exynos chipsets. 

Exynos 2200 vs Snapdragon 888 benchmark scores

The purported Exynos 2200 scores that you see below are only a tad above the Galaxy S21 benchmarks, yet at a much lower clock frequency. Given that there will likely be further refinements to both the engineering prototype and the chipset software management, we can reasonably expect a faster S22 performance compared to the S21 in their Exynos versions.

Galaxy S22 Exynos 2200 vs Galaxy S21 Exynos 2100 benchmark scores

When it comes to the Exynos 2200 vs Snapdragon 888 scores, though, the new Samsung chipset wins by a larger margin as Qualcomm’s processor is clocked at a comparable level. There will be a new, Snapdragon 898 processor in the Galaxy S22, though, so that Exynos 2200 advantage might be moot by then.

Galaxy S22 Exynos 2200 vs Galaxy S21 Snapdragon 888 benchmark scores

Needless to say, pure synthetic benchmarks are only a part of the equation, and sustained performance, as well as throttling under pressure are the ultimate criteria to look at. In the case of the Exynos 2200-laden Galaxy S22, we will also be very, very interested to parse the pure graphics subsystem scores, AMD mRDNA GPU and all that.

Google Pixel 6 Pro vs Galaxy S21 Ultra battery life and charging speeds

Best battery life, faster charging

Both phones sport giant 5000mAh batteries, and the Galaxy S21 Ultra already proved to be the longest lasting Android flagship phone in its top-shelf specs segment, so we expect nothing less from the S22 Ultra. It will have a more efficient processor and display, so a slight improvement in battery life is a reasonable expectation to have. 

The S22 Ultra will also finally be able to support fast 45W charging speeds, putting it on an equal footing with the Chinese competition. Why equal given that they are already at 65W or even 120W?