UPDATED 20:30 EDT / JANUARY 10 2023

APPS

Here’s what to expect at Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked event Feb. 1

Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. will hold a “Galaxy Unpacked” event on Feb. 1 where its flagship S range of phones will be unveiled.

Samsung holds the event in January or February every year and, along with its flagship phone range, often announces some surprises as well.

The new Galaxy S23 series is described in the event announcement today as “the epitome of how we define the ultimate premium experience,” before being claimed as “raising the bar and setting new standards for what’s epic.”

Despite Samsung’s colorful descriptions, the phones are expected to feature only minor upgrades. The most significant expected change with the S23 range is that Samsung is believed to be abandoning Exynos-powered versions of phones in favor of Qualcomm Inc. Snapdragon chips. Samsung has previously offered the S range with Qualcomm chips in the U.S. but used its own Exynos chips in phones sold in Europe and Asia.

The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip is expected to be featured across the entire range. According to reports, the Samsung-manufactured Qualcomm chip will feature an overclocked high-performance X-3 core running at a clock speed of 3.32 gigahertz. The chip will be faster than the standard Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 SoC, which has a clock speed of 3.2 gigahertz.

The top-of-the-range Galaxy S23 Ultra is believed to include a 200MP camera censor and offer support for recording 8K video at 30 frames per second compared with the 24 frames per second on the S22 Ultra. The Ultra will also be offered with Samsung’s S Pen and a silo to house it, a feature that first appeared with the S22 Ultra and harks back to the now-discontinued Samsung Note range.

The S23 range will reportedly offer SuperAMOLED displays with 1,750 nits. The base S23 is expected to ship with a 3,900-milliamp-hour battery, up from 3,700-mAh in the previous model and the S23+ is expected to have a 4,700-mAh battery, up from 4,500 mAH. The S23 Plus and Ultra models are believed to have the same 5,000-mAh battery seen last year.

The form factor of the phones is expected to be roughly the same as the S22 lineup, with the possibility of new color choices. According to leaked images, one notable change is that the rear cameras on the phone no longer feature a camera island, with the cameras protruding individually from the phone’s back panel.

As for surprises, there is some speculation that Samsung may debut some new Galaxy smartwatches, but other reports suggest that they will not appear until the second half of the year. Folding smartphones are an outside chance as well, but like its smartwatches, Samsung has previously held back new models until later in the year.

Image: Samsung

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