Samsung South Africa unveiled its Galaxy S25 series at a local launch event on 22 January, surprising attendees with the announcement that rather than a price rise, consumers would see a price reduction compared to the S24 series.

Samsung’s announcement of the Galaxy series focused heavily on AI features, which would be powered by Samsung’s own AI as well as Google’s Gemini.

However, if you wanted to see significant hardware changes, you’re out of luck as few updates were made outside of the phones’ processor.

Here’s a look at what Samsung announced and how much the phones will cost in South Africa…

Galaxy S25 AI features

Samsung continued the trend it established in 2024 by focusing on AI features that come with the newest Galaxy devices.

The company heralds the AI capabilities as a “new era of AI integration” thanks to its multimodal capabilities and improvements in natural language processing.

One of the examples Samsung gave was the ability to use natural language to search for a specific image in your gallery.

Meanwhile, you will also be able to command Google Gemini to perform functions across various Samsung and Google apps. One example given is finding your favourite sports team’s schedule and adding it to your Samsung Calendar with just your voice.

Other features include the ability to transcribe calls and the ability to generate images through text, sketch, and image prompts.

There is also a focus on AI personalization. With the S25 series, Samsung will use the “Personal Data Engine” to create highly personalized features based on your routines and habits. This data is kept on the device and secured by Knox Vault.

Hardware changes

When it comes to hardware changes, the biggest change is the inclusion of the Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset with a 3nm process. According to Samsung, this provides a boost in the performance of the devices’ NPU, CPU, and GPU.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra has a few extra hardware changes. The phone now features more rounded edges. With a reduction in the size of the bezel, the display also now measures 6.9 inches — an increase from the S24 Ultra’s 6.8 inches.

Samsung also replaced the S24 Ultra’s 12MP ultra-wide angle lens with a 50MP ultra-wide angle lens. The S25 Ultra also includes Corning Gorilla Armor 2, a glass-ceramic material, which the company says is more durable than typical glass.

In South Africa, the S25 Ultra will also be available in three storage variants: 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB.

However, other than those changes, the hardware specs remain mostly the same between the S24 and S25 series, especially when it comes to the standard S25 and S25+. The S25 does include a boost to RAM, featuring 12GB of RAM.

Galaxy S25 specs

• Display: 6.2-inch FHD+ AMOLED 2X display with 120Hz refresh rate
• Processor: Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy
• Main camera: 12MP ultrawide lens + 50MP wide lens + 10MP telephoto lens
• Selfie camera: 12MP
• Battery: 4000mAh
• RAM: 12GB
• On-board storage: 128GB / 256GB / 512GB

Galaxy S25+ specs

• Display: 6.7-inch QHD+ AMOLED 2X display with 120Hz refresh rate
• Processor: Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy
• Main camera: 12MP ultrawide lens + 50MP wide lens + 10MP telephoto lens
• Selfie camera: 12MP
• Battery: 4900mAh
• RAM: 12GB
• On-board storage: 256GB / 512GB

Galaxy S25 Ultra specs

• Display: 6.9-inch QHD+ AMOLED 2X display with 120Hz refresh rate
• Processor: Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy
• Main camera: 200MP wide-angle lens + 50MP (5x optical zoom) telephoto lens + 50MP ultra-wide angle lens + 10MP telephoto camera (3x optical zoom)
• Selfie camera: 12MP
• Battery: 5000mAh
• RAM: 12GB
• On-board storage: 256GB / 512GB / 1TB

Galaxy S25 series price in South Africa

So what will you pay for the new flagship phones in South Africa?

The Galaxy S25 has a recommended retail price of R19,999, down from the S24’s launch price of R22,499. Meanwhile, the Galaxy S25+ has a recommended retail price of R23,499, down from the S24+’s launch price of R25,999.

For the S25 Ultra, Samsung has listed a recommended retail price ranging from R29,999 to R34,999 depending on storage capacity.

You can see the separate Galaxy S25 Ultra prices below:

• Galaxy S25 Ultra 256GB: R29,999
• Galaxy S25 Ultra 512GB: R31,999
• Galaxy S25 Ultra 1TB: R34,999

When launched in 2024, the Galaxy S24 Ultra has a starting price of R32,499.

The Galaxy S25 series will be available in South Africa from 14 February. Pre-orders are open now.

_{Featured image: Samsung}