Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus packs almost everything an average user ever wants with a smartphone. The phone is undeniably a powerful handset and a competent phone, but not everyone can pay for it.

Display

The S10 Plus has the biggest screen we have seen on a smartphone belonging to the S line. Its 6.4-inch Super AMOLED panel can match the size of the Note 9 and a lot bigger than that of the S9 Plus.

The highlight here is the screen-to-body ratio of 93.1%, which squeezes more pixels into a slimmer body. Samsung opts for a hole at the top-right corner to house the two selfie cameras instead of a notch.

The standard resolution here is set at Full HD+, but if you bump it up to QHD+, you will get an even sharper screen. The HDR10+ option offers mesmerizing colors and contrast.

Minimizing the bezels makes for a more eye-appealing phone, but the drawback here is false touches are more likely to happen.

Overall, the Infinity-O screen of Samsung is bright, colorful, and fantastic.

Processor

Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus packs enough power to rival the best gaming phones on the market. In the US, the phone is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 chip but in other parts of the world, what we have is the Exynos 9820 chip.

The octa-core chip comes with RAM of 8GB, offering plenty of power.

The Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus comes really close to iPhone XS in terms of the Geekbench score. In fact, when it comes to storage, the Samsung phone has the edge over its Apple rival with 128GB, with 110GB spare for you to use.

If that isn’t enough already, users have the choice to acquire the phone in 512GB or 1TB of storage, for extra money of course.

Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus is the first phone adapting Wi-Fi 6, enabling a seamless transition between Wi-Fi routers. The phone is believed to deliver 20% more speed compared to the S9’ however, you will need to get a new router to take advantage of this feature.

RAM

With 8GB of RAM, users can rest assured that the phone can handle almost anything they throw at it.

Battery

Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus is a series of firsts for the S line. Besides the new Wi-Fi standard, the phone is also the first to have a 4,100mAh battery.

According to Samsung, the power cell can deliver an all-day battery with a bit of extra, might be because it wat to play it safe, given the big demanding screen.

Under moderate use, with a few hours of streaming Netflix, one hour or two on Spotify, and a few more hours messaging and social media, you can easily have up to 30% of juice left in the cell at the end of the day.

With some more features added, you will definitely see a drain of battery. Some of the culprits dangerous to the phone’s battery life are QHD+, HD+, and always-on display.

Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus comes equipped with a wide range of power-saving modes to prolong the time you have left before you need to reach for the charger. The most aggressive option will limit your use to a few key apps only, making sure that you can have a few hours from the few percentages left.

Camera

Like the S10, the S10 Plus packs a triple-lens camera setup on the back, consisting of a 12MP snapper, a 12MP telephoto lens, and a 16MP ultra-wide camera.

The dual-aperture lens allows for vibrant pictures and good low-light performance. However, the performance isn’t consistent across shots so you might want to take several pictures of the same scene and pick the best one.

The Galaxy S10 Plus is among the best camera phones in 2019. It can take photos with punchy and bright colors, compared to muted images taken by the iPhones.

In comparison with Pixel 3, the low-light performance is decent but is far from the best on the market.

The ultra-wide camera on the Galaxy S10 Plus can do something Google’s handsets can’t – taking photos with a field of view of 123 degrees.

This means if you want to squeeze more details into one shot, you won’t have to take a few steps away from the subject to do so.

Bear in mind that the wide-angle camera comes with a fisheye effect, which distorts objects and people at the edge of shots. So if you want to avoid this, use the lens for scenes with main subjects packed in the middle, like a group of people or a sweeping landscape.

Galaxy S10 Plus makes taking portrait shots a lot more fun as Samsung has given users a few extra options to choose from.

The well-loved background blur effect is still there, with adjustable intensity toggled with an on-screen slider. With it come three other options, which are Zoom, Spin, and Color Point.

The former two add a little more fun, and arty effects to your photos while the latter turn the background black and white all while keeping the subjects in colors.

These modes work well and result in stunning shots. You can use them with the selfie camera too to highlight yourself at the center of the picture and your surrounding turned black and white.

The dual front-facing cameras comprise a 10MP and an 8MP which is for enhancing depth. This combination results in the best Live Focus shots you can get with any smartphones in the S lineup.

The selfie cameras produce good-looking shots in almost any situation, except for when there isn’t enough light.

In low-light, subjects appear soft-looking as the phone tries too hard to smooth out noises. However, the poor night performance issue isn’t limited to Samsung handsets so it’s not something you can complain about.

The question here is whether users really need another camera on the front. The answer is, unfortunately, no. The differences between selfie photos taken by the S10 Plus and those of S10 are mild.