Samsung Galaxy Note 10: Pros, Cons, And X Factor

| Updated: Thursday, August 22, 2019, 15:15 [IST]

Samsung finally pulled the curtains from its much-awaited Galaxy Note 10 and the Galaxy Note 10+ recently. Now, the devices have paved their way to the Indian market as well. These are the most expensive Note series smartphones till date and are also the most powerful . The Galaxy Note 10+ is a full-blown flagship smartphone, whereas, the Galaxy Note 10 is also a flagship device with a few compromises.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10: Pros, Cons, And X Factor

Just like the Galaxy S10 series, the company is following the tradition of launching two smartphones, one at a slightly lower price. The Galaxy Note 10 sits between the Galaxy Note 10+ and the Galaxy Note 9 in terms of features like the display resolution and the battery size. However, in terms of capability, it is as good as the Galaxy Note 10+.

With the starting price of Rs. 69,999 what does the Galaxy Note 10 offers? Is it worth putting your bets on? Let's break it down for you.

The Good

Design - Premium In And Out

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10 is one of the most premium-looking smartphones available in India. The phone has a 6.3-inch display which extends itself to the edges to make it look like an all-screen smartphone. The phone has an Infinity-O notch at the top of the display that houses the selfie camera.

The back and the front of the phone is protected by 2.5D curved Corning Gorilla Glass 6. The device is slim as well as light, which makes it easy for one-hand operations. The glass back enables the company to include features like wireless charging. Though the glass looks and feels premium the device is susceptible to damage compared to a plastic or metal body phone.

The bottom portion of the phone uses the USB Type-C port, main speaker, S-Pen, and the main microphone. The SIM slow is on the top portion which can accept two nano-SIM cards.

The phone has a 6.3-inch edge-to-edge dual-curved AMOLED display with FHD+ resolution with 400+ ppi. Though there is a cut down in screen resolution, the Galaxy Note 10 still has one of the best 1080p displays on any phone.

The display offers an ample amount of brightness with support for HDR10+ playback. As expected, the smartphone does support HDR playback on platforms like YouTube, Amazon Prime Videos, and Netflix.

The bezels around the phone are also minimal, which makes it a great device for consuming multimedia content and gaming. Unlike the Galaxy Note 10+, the base model does not support screen resolution tweaking.

Cameras — Shines In Almost Every Lighting Condition

The Galaxy Note 10 has a triple camera setup with a 12MP primary camera with a variable aperture, 16MP ultra-wide-angle-lens, and a 12MP telephoto lens.

The company has tweaked the camera software to get the most out of the triple camera setup. The phone supports features like 4K video recording with live background blur, 960fps super slow-motion. I tried taking some photos in the artificial lighting condition at the launch event and the images came out really well with a good amount of details. However, the images did look a tad saturated.

We will be pushing the camera to its limits in our further testing and come up with a detailed review soon.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10 draws power from the Exynos 9825 SoC, which is an in-house processor and the first from the company to use 7nm fabrication. The chipset is clubbed with 8GB RAM and 256GB storage.

The Exynos 9825 is a highly capable processor which comes with Mali-G76 MP12 GPU. In my brief experience, the device handled games like PUBG and Fortnite with the highest possible graphics settings.

Compact Form-Factor

The Galaxy Note series smartphones have always been a two-hand device. However, this changes with the Galaxy Note 10. The Galaxy Note 10 is comfortable to hold in a single hand and it is light in weight making it easy to carry around. Though it is small in size, the smartphone is as powerful as the Galaxy Note 10+ in almost all aspects.

The Bad

Battery - Slightly Smaller Capacity

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10 comes with a 3500 mAh battery, which seems like a bit of a downgrade compared to the 4000 mAh battery on the Galaxy Note 9 and the 4300 mAh battery on the Galaxy Note 10+. Though the phone supports 25W fast charging I am not sure about the actual battery life of the smartphone.

No Headphone Jack

Samsung trolled Apple for removing the headphone jack on the iPhone 7 and Samsung has done the same almost after three years. Samsung was one of the last premium smartphone makers that have decided to ditch the jack.

Though the 3.5mm headphone jack is old-tech, it does have a fair amount of advantage over wireless earphones. It is almost impossible to find a good pair of budget earphones with support for high-quality audio output. Similarly, even on some of the expensive wireless earphones that I have tested there will be a bit of an audio lag while playing games like PUBG. Thought the phone comes with an AKG tuned Type-C earphones. Besides, there is no Type-C dongle in the box, which is a bummer.

X-Factor

S-Pen Now Comes With More Tricks

The all-new S-Pen on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10 is now capable of doing a lot more than the previous-gen stylus. The S-Pen can be used to control media, and the company has also introduced air gestures, which can be used to control different camera aspects without touching the screen.

The S-Pen can also be used as a camera shutter button. Using the Samsung Dex feature one can make sketches using the S-Pen which can be mirrored to a big screen monitor in real-time. The Air-Gestures will also come handy for bloggers who shoot a lot of videos on their devices.

The S-Pen comes handy while taking notes, scribbling new design, and doing tasks which require precise touch input. The S-Pen charges automatically whenever it is inside the phone and when it is taken out, the options related to S-Pen will pop-up on the screen.

Hit Or A Miss?

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10 is a compact Note flagship for those who do not fancy a big screen. It comes with all the goodness of a Note smartphone in a compact form factor, making it one of the best smartphones for those who have smaller hands. For the asking price, the Galaxy Note 10 is a bit expensive than the launch price of the Galaxy Note 9. Besides, the phone also has a low-resolution screen and a smaller battery.

If you are okay with a slightly bigger screen and ready to spend additional Rs. 10,000, then, the Galaxy Note 10+ might be the opt device. However, for those who are adamant about getting smaller flagship phone, the Galaxy Note 10 is the right choice. Stay tuned to GizBot for the full review of the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.