You know when you just want your gear to work so you never have to think about it, and can get on with your anxiety-inducing spiral of incessantly checking for updates on the coronavirus pandemic? That’s been the Galaxy S20 for me this past week.
As I’ve been spending the wee hours of the night refreshing Twitter, I’ve woken up to find Samsung’s latest phone hidden somewhere under the bedsheets instead of its usual place on the wireless charger next to my bed. Thankfully it doesn’t matter if I forget to recharge it overnight: its battery is so good, it runs well into the following morning. I’m seeing this level of excellence in all parts of the phone; everything is so frictionless that I never had to struggle with the S20 in any capacity.
The Galaxy S20 is one of three new phones in Samsung’s most popular line of handsets. It’s joined by the Galaxy S20 Ultra (8/10 WIRED Recommends), a $1,400 phone that’s massive and genuinely great but struggles to justify its high price tag, as well as the S20 Plus ($1,200), a larger version of the base-model S20, which I used for a week before switching to the smaller device.
If the S20 Ultra has a hard time justifying its price, the S20 Plus has a hard time justifying its existence. The differences between it and the regular S20 are so few that the $200 price gap makes little sense. The Galaxy S20 is the way to go, but only if you’re looking for an uncompromising Android phone. The S20 still costs $1,000 after all, and you can get a perfectly good phone for much less.
Nailing the Basics, and Then Some
The appeal starts with the phone’s size. The 6.7-inch Galaxy S20 Plus isn’t as unwieldy as the gargantuan S20 Ultra with its 6.9-inch screen, but it still requires you to shuffle it in your hand (or employ your other hand) to reach the top of the screen. I couldn’t be happier with the Galaxy S20, though. It fits my palm and slips into my pockets. Also, tapping all parts of the 6.2-inch screen is easy—my partner, whose hands are significantly smaller than mine, agrees.
But don’t let the smaller size fool you. Even if it gives me a better grip, the S20 is still an all-glass slab, so you should snag a case. (I really like this one from Griffin.) You’ll really want to protect that OLED screen, not just because it’s expensive to repair, but it’s also quite stunning.
The screen stretches all the way to the corners of the phone, with a small, centered “hole punch” for the selfie camera. The display looks and feels futuristic. Better yet, the screen has no trouble illuminating the darkest scenes from Dracula on Netflix, and it brushes off harsh sunlight, making it easy to read outdoors.
But the standout feature here is the 120 Hz r