I have a funny confession to make (or sad, depending on how you look at it).
I am a very online person. As in, I have all the apps, I try out all the games, I get all the online humour. I use the internet as a sounding board for my problems, I scroll mercilessly into the late hours of the night and my camera roll has tens of thousands of photos (half of them are memes, the other half are bus routes because I have a terrible memory).
Nonetheless, what I’m trying to say is, I’m in an incredibly committed relationship with my phone.
And that’s why, for the last week, I’ve been diving deep into the world of the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra.
The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra has a sleek, slim-line design with a glass front and a frosted glass back – mine came in lavender.
The phone also came with a pen – which, if I’m being honest, made me a little nervous to begin with. I was afraid I was going to lose it and find little to no interest in it.
I was wrong. At the start of my day I usually write a to-do-list in a notebook, (I know, it's a little old school) but it's the easiest way for me to figure out what tasks I need to prioritise.
Instead of writing a messy list on paper, I turned into an artist in my notes app to track what tasks I needed done for the day.
It was so easy and way more enjoyable – I couldn't wait to cross a task of my list!
I also found myself scrolling late into the night and making good use of the pen. It was a grand ol’ time.
What I love about the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra isn't something I even knew I cared about – taking photos at night time.
I’m not all that obsessed with photography but I became obsessed with trialling this stellar device. It's shooting mode almost made me want to pursue photography. The back camera has two lenses with the capability to zoom up to ten times. What I loved using the most was the wide-angle camera lens. A simple swipe up or swipe down on the screen allows you to switch between the front and back cameras.
The coolest feature in the camera is by far the Astro mode. This feature takes the clearest photos of the stars that I've ever seen, even if you live right in the middle of a concrete jungle (Sydney, I’m talking about you). There’s even a hyper-lapse camera feature that lets you get videos of the sunset or sunrise.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is, there is no need to “step into the light” for a better photo with this device. Nor, is it necessary for your friends to hold up their own phone’s flashlight to give some more depth to a photo. The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is solid enough to get a cute Insta pic on its own.
That's not to say the front camera didn’t impress me either, the 12MP dual pixel lens front camera got my best angles every time.
With the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, it's nice to know that all my favourite memories can be securely backed up by Google Photos. I can also easily find photos of people, or animals through facial recognition, geographic location or through searching image categories. So, if I want to find that photo I took of my friend 6 months ago, I can find it within seconds thanks to Google Photos.
Storage is also pretty important to me. I don't really delete anything, so I need a lot of space to keep all my photos, files and more. That’s where Google One comes in. With Google One, you can get up to 15GB of free storage and if you ever need more, you can subscribe to Google One with plans starting at 100 GB. I’ll never have to delete a thing.
I’m no phone nerd honestly and I’m a habitual creature – change makes me nervous. But, when trying the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra for a week, it became even more reliable than my other well-used device and it was the phone I reached for constantly... even if it was only to send out a text or write down a reminder.
There were a lot of phone hacks that surprised me. As someone who isn’t necessarily tech savvy either, (I’m a Gen Z so I’m arguably not that bad compared to other generations – no offence Gen X), I still found myself double-tapping the power button to auto-open the camera or setting up my voice automation to say cheese and have the selfie cam open up straight away.
What was even more fascinating to me about the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is just how… fancy… it is.
With the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, I had no issues getting a great connection with the Optus 5G network. Optus offers plenty of affordable plans to choose from – depending on how much data you chew through and how many international phone calls you want to make. As someone whose family lives overseas, it was refreshing to have no issues getting a video chat in or making a quick phone call to check in with my nieces on the other side of the world.
Over the last week, the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra became more than just a phone I trialled. It became my trusted memory holder, my access to the rest of the world through social media and my preferred choice to connect with my family overseas.
The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is a device that gave me unrivalled options – ones that actually made my life easier.
The Samsung S23 Ultra is now available at Optus.
Feature Image: Supplied.