Switching phones is always a gamble. You are waiting for something new, something exciting – maybe even better. And to be honest, the Galaxy S26 Ultra delivers on that promise in more ways than one. It’s one of the most technically impressive smartphones available today, packing a 6.85-inch 2K LTPO AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate, a maximum brightness of up to 2,600 nits, and Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip, which gives it roughly 10–15% more performance.
But after spending time with it, I found myself in a strange situation. The more I appreciate what Samsung has built, the more I miss my iPhone 17 Pro.
Privacy Screen has a real trade-off
The standout feature this year is easily Samsung’s privacy display. It uses a pixel-level brightness control to limit viewing angles, effectively making your screen unreadable from the sides. In theory, it’s brilliant. Actually, it’s really useful – especially in public places like airports or metros where shoulder surfing is a real concern.
Samsung deserves credit here because this isn’t just a software trick. It’s a hardware-driven innovation, and that’s increasingly rare in modern smartphones.
But when you open it, the consensus is clear. The display dims noticeably, color accuracy takes a hit, and the overall viewing experience feels sluggish. This is especially notable because the S26 Ultra’s panel is one of the brightest and brightest in the industry.
And that’s where the difference lies.
Apple does not provide a privacy screen. But they also don’t present aspects that detract from the valuable experience. The iPhone’s approach is slower, more conservative – but also more refined. You don’t get test features, but you also don’t deal with their trade-offs.
A camera upgrade that doesn’t change the result
On paper, the S26 Ultra’s camera system sounds advanced. The main sensor now has a wider aperture of f/1.4, while the telephoto remains at f/2.9, supposedly improving low-light performance. The phone retains its triple 50MP setup, which includes a periscope zoom lens.
In isolation, the results are excellent. Images are sharp, bright, and social media ready.
But compared to the S25 Ultra, the difference is small. In most real-world situations, you’d be hard-pressed to tell which phone took the shot unless you were looking for it. Even benchmark comparisons and joint tests suggest that improvements are incremental rather than transformative.
Meanwhile, the iPhone continues to excel in key areas day after day – video consistency, color accuracy, and optimization of apps like Instagram and Snapchat. Apple’s photography may not always push the boundaries, but it does deliver predictability.
Samsung is innovating. Apple is refining. And more often than not, refinement wins in everyday use.
Performance and AI: Powerful, but surprising
There is no denying the raw power of the S26 Ultra. The Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 delivers top-tier performance, and the device handles everything – from gaming to multitasking – effortlessly. But the main focus this year is AI.
Samsung packed the phone with features: AI image editing, generation fill, object insertion, writing assistants, real-time translation, and contextual suggestions with tools like Now Brief or Now Nudge. These features are technically amazing, but they come with limitations. AI-generated images often come out at low resolutions – incompatible with the phone’s native display. Editing images can reduce the quality by up to 20–30%, making them ineffective in the long run.
More importantly, many of these tools feel optional rather than essential. It’s the features you try, not the features you rely on.
And over time, that starts to feel exhausting.
The iPhone, by contrast, takes a different approach. It integrates AI quietly, focusing on tasks that improve existing workflows rather than introducing entirely new ones. It does little – but it does it consistently.
The irony of it all
The S26 Ultra didn’t make me dislike Android. It reminded me why I love iOS.
Because while Samsung tries bold features – privacy displays, AI tools, camera adjustments – Apple focuses on stability, consistency, and polish. And that difference becomes more noticeable when you use both for a long time. The features you admire are not always the ones you remember.
My last take
The Galaxy S26 Ultra is a unique device. It’s powerful, flexible, and packed with features that push the boundaries of what a smartphone can do. But using it didn’t feel like an improvement in my daily life. It was like I was entering a different philosophy. And sometimes, that’s enough to make you realize that what you appreciate isn’t innovation for its own sake – but the way everything fits together seamlessly.
And with that, I found myself missing my iPhone 17 Pro more than I expected.
