Samsung started selling the Galaxy S20 series of phones in Kenya more than two months ago. The devices are, as you would expect, very good, and to showcase their superiority in almost all features a user could want, it slaps them with a premium price.
Can’t afford the S20s then? No problem, because last year’s S10s are equally capable, and even come with a headphone jack of the audio socket is a big deal to you like is to me. Even better is that the S10s are cheaper now.
Now, Samsung has updated the S10s with some S20 features, which sweetens their appeal further. The same updates have also graced the Note10 line, which was released in late 2019.
Let’s look at them, albeit briefly. Shall we?
First, Samsung has always had good cameras, although it has since lost the top position to the likes of Apple’s iPhones and Google’s Pixel line. It doesn’t mean that the snappers are not good – they are excellent, bearing in mind that the South Korean manufacturer brings in additional features to photo and video experiences tucked in OneUI, its skin overlay over Android.
The S20s have advanced photo and video features including Single Take that uses advanced algorithms to take multiple photos and videos in one instance, and recommends the best image for you.
Single Take is now available for the S10s and Note10s too alongside OneUI 2.1.
Night mode has also been improved – but the S10 already got the feature in 2019. It is just better now – and hey, you can capture night hyperlapse now on the two 2019 flagship lines.
Secondly, the stock gallery app has also been replenished with some features that will make the entire media viewing and sharing experience better. The app can now automatically group similar images together. The best image in the group can be set as a thumbnail.
Lastly, Samsung has also been selling Quick Share, which allows a user to send small or large files to multiple people. The only problem is that they need Quick Share for this to work – which them limits supported devices to the S20s, S10s, and the Note10s. The feature is obviously reserved for flagship lines because it is even missing on the A-series. In fact, the features have not been extended to the Note10 Lite that is available locally too, but that is not the point.
I got these features in March, but they started rolling out widely last month. They include, among many other behind the scenes updates, the ability to power off your devices from quick shortcuts, meaning you don’t have to press any buttons to do so.