Best Smartphones for Battery Life (2024)

One of the major reasons to choose the S23 Plus over the S23 is its larger display. It features a 6.6-inch screen compared to the 6.1-inch display of the S23. Additionally, it has a dynamic AMOLED display with a 1080p resolution and a 120 hertz refresh rate.

This display looks great; it's sharp and contrasty, and the color accuracy is spot on. You also get HDR 10 Plus support.

However, like the rest of the Galaxy lineup, there's no support for 10-bit color here.

One of the major updates of the S23 series is a new custom chipset. It is not an Exynos; current flagships are coming out with the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, but Samsung is using a special version with higher CPU and GPU clock speeds.

The performance is excellent in both everyday tasks and heavy gaming.

While the thermal management of the S23 Plus is okay, we did experience some throttling during our prolonged stress test.

The main camera captures flagship-grade 12-megapixel photos. The level of detail is great, and so is the dynamic range, and you get vibrant colors in typical Samsung fashion.

The telephoto cam captures impressive photos; they're sharp and detailed, even though they're upscaled from 10 megapixels to 12.

The ultra-wide cam does a decent job. There's a reasonable level of detail for this sort of camera, and the colors also match the other two cameras well.

The selfie camera is actually very different. Unlike the previous 10-megapixel lens, this is now a 12-megapixel selfie lens, and you can shoot 4K at 60 frames per second with it.

The interface of the S23 Plus is Samsung's One UI 5.1 on top of Android 13.

It's a highly customizable UI that is also quite fluid and snappy, thanks to version 5's behind-the-scenes optimizations.

Version 5.1 on the new Galaxy phones adds a couple of extra tweaks: there's a new battery widget and an improved weather widget.

The iPhone 15 has an all-new design that's simply gorgeous.

This year, you can now get the dynamic island on the non-Pro iPhones.

The iPhone 15 has a 6.1-inch screen and, by 2023 standards, feels pretty compact.

These are 60Hz displays and not ultra-fluid 120Hz displays.

This phone is equipped with Apple's powerhouse A16 Bionic chip.

The iPhone 15 has given me no lag or performance jitters.

Phones are expected to be about 20% faster than the 14.

The iPhone 15 has been upgraded with a new 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera and a new 48-megapixel main camera.

The iPhone 15's camera is better than the Pro phones from last year.

The 15s take photos at twice that resolution.

The Dynamic Island is a major part of iOS, and it significantly enhances the user experience.

The optimization of iOS with Apple's hardware is as seamless as it is.

The display of the OnePlus 12r is a curved 6.78-inch LTPO OLED with a 120 Hz refresh rate.

This resolution comes out to 450 PPI, which is not quite as sharp as the QHD on the flagship OnePlus 12, but it is still great.

The panel also supports 10-bit color depth, HDR10+ video, and Dolby Vision.

The screen's brightness is excellent too; we measured over 800 nits.

You get last year's flagship chipset instead of the latest one, but that's still enough for high-end gaming performance.

The cameras on the OnePlus 12 are stripped down.

The most noticeable stylistic element is the round camera bump, which melds into a wraparound piece of the aluminum frame.

The 12r has an alert slider on the side; it's a signature feature of OnePlus phones.

The phone has an IP65-rated ingress protection, which means it can resist splashes or even jets of water, but you should avoid full submersion.

The display of the phone is a 6.78-inch LTPO OLED with a 1080p resolution, a 144 Hz refresh rate, and Gorilla Glass Victus 2 protection.

The brightness here is impressive; we measured a maximum of 830 nits with a manual slider.

The screen is a 144 Hz LTPO AMOLED display, which means it can go all the way down to 1 Hz if there's nothing on the screen that requires a rapid refresh rate.

The phone ships with a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, a top-of-the-line processor.

The Zen phone comes with up to 16 GB of RAM and 512 GB of storage, but if you live in the US, you only have the option of 12 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage.

The Zenphone 11 Ultra has a smooth matte glass back. You also get a subtle geometric pattern to spice things up and a square black camera island.

There's a crack in my camera lens because it protrudes so much that it's one of the easiest parts to hit the ground when the camera falls.

Of course, there's a bit of Android 14 action here, and Asus is guaranteeing 4 years of security updates with this device, but sadly, only two guaranteed OS updates.

Sadly, this past fortnight, I have also experienced a considerable amount of issues, mostly connectivity-related shenanigans.

The display of the Rog Phone 7 Ultimate is a 6.78-inch AMOLED with a 1080p resolution, Gorilla Glass Victus protection, and a whopping 165Hz refresh rate.

The maximum brightness is a nice improvement from last year's model. We measured up to 520 nits with the manual slider, and this can boost to 1100 nits in auto mode when in bright conditions.

The Rog Phone 7 Ultimate doesn't disappoint with its Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2.

It packs significantly more power under the hood than the Snapdragon A Plus Gen 1 or the MediaTek Dimensity 9000 Plus, and it's rather power-efficient as well.

The rear cameras of the Rog Phone 7 haven't changed from the previous generation. You get a 50-megapixel main camera, a 13-megapixel ultra-wide camera, and a 5-megapixel macro cam.

The camera quality of the Rog 7 Series is decent, but it won't blow anyone away. The focus here is gaming, not cameras.

The phone's interface is Rog UI on top of Android 13.

Additionally, Asus is promising two major OS updates and four years of security updates for the Rog 7 generation.

The Mark 6 is actually wider than previous models, which had a tall and narrow 21:9 screen aspect ratio.

The new model can reach up to around 800 nits with a manual slider, and it can boost to above 1300 nits in auto mode when needed.

The Xperia uses Bravia AI Tech to improve picture quality, and there's also support for 10-bit color in HDR10 video.

The Experia 1 Mark 6 is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, its flagship chipset, with 12 gigs of RAM.

Unfortunately, when it comes to benchmark scores, the Xeria 1 Mark 6 does not seem to be at the same level as the best performers in the industry.

We observed significant thermal throttling during our prolonged stress tests.

The Xperia flagships are well known for their advanced cameras, and the Mark 6 continues that tradition by bringing an upgraded telephoto camera and a revamped camera interface.

You receive a dedicated two-step shutter button for the cameras.

There are no real shocks or surprises on the software side, where it's Android 14 with the usual shenanigans slapped on top.

Sony guarantees you three OS updates and four years of security updates.

The interface of the Xeria 1 Mark 6 is very close to stock Android in both look and feel.

It becomes much brighter.

Many of you will probably love that this new screen supports high PWM dimming.

Consider factors such as glare, light fall-off, and drop test durability.

And then, it has the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip inside.

It doesn't feel like it's been upgraded in years.

It has two more megapixels.

The HDR effect looks fine, but it falls apart a little too quickly as soon as there are adverse conditions.

Then, switch to portrait mode.

I don't know why, but perhaps the biggest legitimate downside of this phone, when compared to other flagships it's competing against, is its promised fewer years of software update support.

By a proper box, I mean it is mostly a waste of space since the entire insert on top is just filled with booklet after booklet, as if we're still in 2002. However, underneath the phone, there is not just a USB-C cable but also a top-of-the-line 100 W charging brick, which does sweeten the deal. Oh, and the phone also comes with a pre-applied screen protector.

The display of the phone is a 6.7-inch OLED with a 1220p resolution and a 144 Hz refresh rate.

The display itself looks great; it's plenty sharp and contrasty.

The Pantone validation in the natural color mode ensures that colors and skin tones are accurate by their standards.

There's support for HDR10 Plus video too, but not for Dolby Vision.

The Pro model isn't the flagship anymore, which means the ED50 Pro doesn't get the top chipset.

The Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 with UFS 2.2 storage has no updates. Well, that's a lot.

Absolutely love it, like a great camera IP.

And then, there's camera lag.

The Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 with UFS 2.2 storage has no updates. Well, that's a lot.

The Galaxy A15 brings the most significant upgrade to the A10 series that we've seen in a while: an AMOLED screen rather than an LCD.

You get a 6.5-inch AMOLED display with a 1080p resolution and a fast 90 Hz refresh rate.

The new screen is sharp and has high contrast.

As far as brightness goes, we measured a maximum of 370 nits with the manual slider, and this increased to over 800 nits in auto mode when exposed to bright light.

Under the hood of the Galaxy A15 4G, there is a Mediatek Helio G99 chipset.

In benchmark tests, the A15 4G won't impress anyone; it's really at the bottom of the ladder when it comes to chipsets.

The Helio G99 is still quite adequate for running the interface and handling everyday tasks smoothly enough.

Occasionally, you may run into some lag or stutter.

We have a new 5-megapixel ultra-wide lens on this phone, compared to the 2-megapixel depth sensor we've seen on these A series phones for ages.

Here is our first look at the new triple-lens setup.

The interface of the A15 is Samsung's One UI 6, running on Android 14.

Despite the phone's budget nature, you get the full suite of functions here, except for the always-on display, DeX, and the studio video editor.

For software support, the A15 4G is eligible for three major Android updates and four years of security patches.

The S24 Ultra features a class-leading 6.8-inch Quad HD AMOLED display, and it is awesome.

They completely flattened the display and extended it to the very corners, featuring some of the thinnest bezels we've seen all around.

Additionally, there is a new anti-reflective coating on this Gorilla Glass Armor that makes a noticeable difference when certain light hits it at off-axis angles.

It offers great high-end performance.

There's the newly added ray tracing, plus a 90% larger vapor chamber to cool the phone for much longer periods.

The primary camera is still the impressive 200-megapixel sensor, with all the same pros and cons.

It has an ultra-wide lens with a bit of distortion near the edges.

And so, the one new thing in hardware this year is that they've gone from a 10-megapixel camera.

The S24 Ultra now shoots everything in HDR by default.

The final highlight of my experience with the S24 Ultra is actually the setup process.

Samsung's default keyboard is another feature I haven't used very much.

I assume that seven generations of software updates basically equate to seven years.