I’m switching from IOS to android and am looking to buy a new phone.
I really dont have time/energy to dig into it too much and i looked around and the s23 seemed quite good and affordable price wise.
I’m not doing too much fancy stuff just needs to be able to last (my iphone has been serving me for 7 years). Any thoughts?
Only thing that’s really necessary is the screen needs to have the ability to dim really dark (which seems to be a thing on the s23) because I have visual sensitivities and eye problems.
Most Android phones also have an extra dim mode. Any phone with an OLED screen will give you true blacks (including the s23).
I’ve always had good experiences with Samsung phones in terms of durability.
Black Friday and the Holiday season is coming up. You might be able to get as s24 for a little bit more but this does take patience.
The upgrade for the s23 to the s24 isn’t really that great hardware wise but if OS updates and security updates matter to you, the s23’s security updates stops in 3 years while the s24 stops in 6 years. Note, the phone will still work after that time but it just won’t get updates anymore. To me that’s worth an extra couple hundred bucks. I don’t like switching phones.
Both phones have extra dim. They also both have a bunch of other visual features too. I’ll list them out:
- Extra dim
- High contrast fonts
- Color inversion
- Color filter
- Color correction
- Adaptive brightness
- Dark or light mode
- Eye comfort shield
- Adaptive color tone
- Natural and Vivid screen modes
- Adjustable font size and style
- Screen resolution (1560x720, 2340x1080, 3120x1440)
On top of these, you can set Modes and Routines if you want to have a different set of settings so you don’t have to fumble through all the setting again. Like let’s say you want Light mode, change the brightness, screen resolution and change the font size. You can set that to one custom Mode.
I also forgot:
- Motion smoothness (60 Hz, 120 Hz)
I’m sure there are more I’m forgetting.
If you have any questions about Modes and Routines that you can’t find the answer to online, let me know. I’ll test it out on my S24+.
Thanks for your comments.
How much does the updates thing matter? Good catch on only supporting three years, I’m hoping the phone I buy lasts atleast 5.
If you don’t care about the newest Android features, it doesn’t matter much.
As for security, this is just my habit, but I don’t trust my banking apps on phones that don’t have the latest security update. I also won’t put anything important in it like work stuff.
I have older phones and they work fine without updates. I still use my stock Pixel 2, which is 7 years old and didn’t have updates for 4 years, for browsing and gaming.
I have the S23 ultra, which has about the same display
It can go very dim with just the standard slider already and on top you can toggle extra dim which has it’s own extra slider. In my pitch black room, reading white on black text I have to stop the extra dim slider to about 3/4th before it starts being too dim to see the screen.
There’s also the blue light filter slider (they call it eye comfort shield) that you can also add on top, it’ll turn everything more on the orange/yellow side making it easier on the eyes.
Otherwise, I say you can’t go wrong with the S series of samsung phones, they’ll last a long time and have the top specs of that year. The S23 has an aluminum frame and if it’s any close to mine it’s very tough, I like looking at durability tests on youtube to get a good idea of how much damage it can take. 100% you have to get a screen protector, film ones work okay, but glass protectors are wayyy better. Glass protectors just feel the same as the display, though if you plan to be rough with it film protectors are easier to replace. I got mine from whitestone, Spigen is good and well recognized too. I say to get a screen protector because just taking it in/out of your pocket after two days you’ll start seeing micro scratches, so this would help with the longevity of the device.
