iPhone 16 Pro Max vs. Galaxy S24 Ultra: Spec Comparison

iPhone 16 Pro Max vs. Galaxy S24 Ultra Apple just unveiled its latest top-of-the-line phone the iPhone 16 Pro Max but how does it stack up against Samsung's flagship phone the Galaxy s24 Ultra let's compare the specs and because these specs can only tell us so much subscribe to ca so you don't miss any of our coverage as we use the new 16 Pro Max and test it alongside the s24 ultra IRL let's start with prices and storage Price and storage while both the iPhones 16 Pro Max and the Galaxy s24 Ultra come in 256 and 512 GB as well as 1 TB storage options the 16 Pro Max starts at $1,200 while the s24 ultra starts at $1,300 the 16 Pro Max features Apple's Performance brand new A8 Pro chip which it says is the brains behind Apple intelligence that's the company's new suite of AI tools that it's launching on the iPhone 16 lineup it lets you do things like change the tone of your messages create your own emoji and search through your photos and videos with keywords there's also a visual intelligence feature that uses your camera and AI to grab info about the world around you I'll tell you more about it when we get into camera specs the s24 ultra has Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 gen 3 chip designed to support Samsung Suite of AI features called Galaxy AI you can use it to do things like live translate calls or remove unwanted Shadows from a photo Google also just introduced its new tensor G4 chip that supports its Suite of Gemini AI features on the latest pixel phones so apple is a little late to the AI party but I'm excited to try Apple intelligence and see how it compares to the competition the 16 Pro Max runs on Apple's new iOS 18 while the s24 ultra runs on Android 14 although Android 15 is coming soon Apple guarantees at least 5 years of security updates for its iPhones and the s24 ultra comes with 7 years of major OS and security updates at 6.9 in the 16 Pro Max has the Displays largest screen ever on an iPhone the s24 ultra display is 6.8 in the 16 Pro Max has an OLED screen with a 2868 by 1320 pixel resolution at 460 PPI while the s24 ultra has an AMOLED screen with a 3120 X 1440 pixel resolution at 501 PPI the displays on both of these phones have 1 to 120 HZ variable refresh rate the 16 Pro Max has a peak brightness of 2,000 nits while the s24 ultra has a peak brightness of 2600 nits it's worth noting that the s24 ultra has an anti-reflective screen that makes everything look more immersive and gives you less of those distracting Reflections that you can get with the iPhone the 16 Pro Max keeps that Dynamic Island pill Notch shape shifting cutout whatever you want to call it that lets you see updates from apps like maps without needing to have them open the s24 ultra on the other hand has no Notch just a whole punch camera despite that Thickness and weight larger screen at 8.25 mm thick the 16 Pro Max is still slightly thinner than the s24 ultra which has a thickness of 8.6 mm the 16 Pro Max is also lighter at 227 G versus 233 for the s24 ultra both the 16 Pro Max and the s24 ultra have titanium frames that Apple and Samsung tout for their strength the 16 Pro Max screen features Apple's newest ceramic Shield material that it claims is two times tougher than any smartphone glass the s24 ultra features Corning Gorilla armor cover glass that Samsung says helps make the phone more scratch resistant both the 16 Pro Max and the s24 ultra are rated ip68 so they're water and dust resistant the s24 ultra comes with an S Pen stylus that stores inside the phone there is no such feature for Apple's new flagship but I will never stop asking for an iPhone stylus or at the very least apple pencil iPhone compatibility perhaps I am just speaking into the void here someone send this to Tim Cook Cameras please next let's talk cameras the 16 Pro Max has a three camera system it has a 48 map Fusion camera with an F 1.78 lens a 48 map ultrawide camera with an f2.2 lens and a 12 megap telephoto camera with an f2.8 lens and a five times optical zoom the s24 ultra on the other hand has a 4 camera system it has a 200 megap wide camera with an f1.7 lens and a 12 megap ultrawide camera with an f2.2 lens it also has one 10 megap telephoto camera with an f2.4 lens and a three times optical zoom and another 50 megap telephoto camera camera with an F 3.4 lens and a five times optical zoom and for your selfies both phones have a 12 megap front camera the one on the 16 Pro Max has an f1.9 lens while the one on the s24 ultra has an f2.2 lens the 16 Pro Max can shoot video in 4k up to 120 frames per second plus spatial video for The Vision Pro in 1080P at 30 frames per second it's worth noting that you can also capture spatial photos for Vision Pro the s24 Ultra can shoot video in 8k up to 30 frames per second stay tuned for our camera test because there are some differences and similarities between these camera specs but you really don't know how things look until you start snapping some photos the iPhone 16 Pro Max has a brand new camera control button press it once to open the camera app press it again to take a photo or hold it to take a video you can also press it to start getting info about your surroundings through that visual intelligence feature I talked about earlier in its glow time keynote Apple showed you how you could use it to identify a dog breed for example the Galaxy s24 Ultra includes Google lens which also uses the camera and AI to scan your surroundings but this phone doesn't have a similar camera control button that being said the s24 ultra's S Pen can be used as a camera remote to take Battery photos both the 16 Pro Max and the s24 ultra have USBC charging ports the 16 Pro Max supports up to 21 wied charging while the s24 ultra supports up to 45 W wied charging both phones also support wireless charging but the s24 ultra has reverse wireless charging too so you can juice up other devices from the back of the phone and to my dismay none of these phones include a charging Brick In The Box Apple doesn't disclose battery capacity but says the 16 Pro Max offers up to 33 hours of video playback the s24 ultra has a 5,000 mAh battery in her s24 Ultra review my colleague Lisa at AO found that after a busy workday doing things like checking email and social media a lot and even streaming some music and video she still had 55% battery left after roughly 13 and 1/2 hours I love taking photos and videos and I am chronically online so I'm notorious for getting even a PR Max battery to drain faster than you might expect so I am very excited to test this new 16 Pro Max battery especially because Apple claims this phone offers a huge leap in battery life and you know I'll of course be filming as I put the battery to the test so I can share my findings with you last but not least Colors let's talk colors the 16 Pro Max comes in desert natural white and black titanium while the s24 ultra comes in black yellow Violet and gray there are also samsung.com exclusive green blue and orange colorways those are some of the key similarities and differences between Apple's iPhone 16 Pro Max and Samsung's Galaxy s24 Ultra you can check out cnet.com for even more spec details on these premium phones and you can pre-order the iPhone 16 Pro Max on Friday September 13th or maybe now depending on when you're watching this and the phone will be released on September 20th please let me know your thoughts on these devices in the comments below and thank you so much for watching