Galaxy S24 Ultra won’t bring major camera upgrades

Samsung may not offer major camera upgrades with the Galaxy S24 Ultra next year. The 2024 model will reportedly pack the same camera hardware as the current Ultra. Apart from some minor improvements, the rear camera array will remain largely unchanged. There’s no information available about the new Ultra’s selfie camera.

There have been rumors earlier this year that Samsung will equip the Galaxy S24 Ultra with a variable zoom lens. It was said to offer continuous optical zoom at all magnification levels between 3x and 10x. It would effectively do the job of both 3x and 10x zoom cameras that the Korean firm’s recent Ultra flagships feature, and do a better job than both of them.

However, subsequent rumors said Samsung can’t pull this off next year. Instead, it plans to replace the 3x zoom lens with a 5X solution on the Galaxy S24 Ultra. But those hopes were also blown away earlier this month. A noted industry insider claimed that the upcoming Ultra model will get a slightly improved 10x zoom camera and that’s about it. Everything else will carry over unchanged, at least at the back.

Tipster Ice Universe has now reiterated this, citing information from unnamed Korean sources. The Galaxy S24 Ultra will continue to use the same 200MP primary camera found on the current Ultra (Samsung’s ISOCELL HP2 sensor). The ultrawide lens will also use the same 12MP Sony IMX564 sensor. The company upgraded to this sensor from the Sony IMX563 on last year’s Galaxy S22 Ultra.

The Galaxy S24 Ultra will get a slightly improved 10x zoom camera

Coming to the zoom cameras, Samsung will keep the 3x solution unchanged too (Sony’s 12MP IMX754 sensor). The 10x zoom camera, on the other hand, uses a slightly improved Sony IMX754+ sensor. It’s unclear what has changed, though. The tipster says it’s just a “negligible adjustment” of the sensor but fails to give more details. It retains the 12MP resolution. The Galaxy S24 Ultra will also feature a laser autofocus sensor.

If this rumor turns out to be accurate, the Galaxy S24 Ultra will not be a major upgrade over the Galaxy S23 Ultra, at least not in the camera department. Samsung could still offer meaningful upgrades in other areas. But the device may not be worth moving on to from the current Ultra. We should come across more details about the Galaxy S24 series once Samsung’s down with its next month’s Galaxy Unpacked event.