Ultramodern Samsung Galaxy S20

Tom Sangala March 4, 2020

731 1 minute read

By Teri Sequeira:

Finally, Samsung unpacked the heir to Samsung Galaxy S10; Samsung Galaxy S20.

We all thought it would be christened S11 but Samsung’s marketing gurus had other ideas.

After all, it is a more telling name; a Samsung Galaxy manufactured in 2020.

Is Galaxy S20 a revolutionary piece as expected? Revolutionary is not quite the word but space-age or, if you like, Avant-grade.

It is a 5G smartphone introduced at a time very few countries have implemented 5G. To be raw, what is the point of owning a 5G phone when such a network is not available in Malawi?

All I am saying is Samsung Galaxy S20 will automatically downgrade to 4G in Malawi.

Because 5G is battery-juice hungry, Samsung had no choice but to ‘bloat’ the sizes of the three variants of the phone.

Samsung S20 is 6.2 inches and packs 4000mAh battery, Samsung Galaxy S20+ is 6.7 inches tall diagonally and loads 4,500 mAh battery and goliath of it all, Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is 6.9 inches and packets 5,000mAh battery.

Although the phones are larger, they feel smaller in the hands because they are just taller yet narrower.

Unlike S10, S20 is not curved although the glass bends slightly downwards. If you ask me, this is a minus as it removes the sea-flow beauty of the display.

However, there is a very good reason for it; it prevents accidental touches of the screen. It is trading off beauty for functionality.

Samsung Galaxy S20 wears a higher qualityInfinity-O display like that mounted on Samsung Galaxy Note 10. It has the best touch sensitivity in the Android world.

Samsung S20 is propelled either by impressive octa-core Qualcom Snapdragon 865 (for USA market) or Samsung’s own octa-core Exynos 990 (for the other markets). As usual, Samsung has been generous on RAM; 12-16 GB. Technically, that is too much but means a lot if you multitask a lot.

Galaxy S20 has 128 GB storage. If you need 256 GB or 512 GB, you will have to buy Galaxy S20+. However the SD expansion slot is back and you can expand your storage up to 1TB.

As with any Samsung flagship phone upgrade, the story is not complete without a some talk about camera improvements. S20 does not feature a true telephoto lens but a bigger 64 MP camera on both S20 and S20+ and 108MP on S20 Ultra that behave like telephoto lens.

Both the standard lens and ultra wide angle lens are returned with improvements. Now you will be able to record 8K videos.

The bad news is that you now have to spend more; $999 for S20, $1,200 for S20+ and $1,400 for S20 Ultra. You can pre-order now and the shipment should be at your doorsteps soon. There is no cheaper feature-reduced S20 version but S10 prices have gone down.