Last August we were able to meet the new members of the Samsung Note family , For a couple of weeks we have been testing the  Samsung Galaxy Note10  (the “base” model) and we want to tell you our opinions and impressions in this analysis in Spanish.

If you are thinking of buying it, then we will tell you the best and worst of the star device of the South Korean company.

Unboxing the Samsung Galaxy Note 10: Samsung Galaxy Note10: the S Pen is still its biggest differentiation

Following the usual packaging line of the company, we find ourselves before an elegant black box with the S Pen as the protagonist. In our case, we have the Aura Glow color unit with the S Pen in blue.

Inside the box, we have the  Note 10 itself, an S Pen, a SIM spike, manuals, a Super Fast Charging wall charger, a kit to change the tips of the S Pen (with replacement tips), AKG headphones and USB cable. 

Quite complete and much better than what other manufacturers have accustomed us to, the first impressions that your box leaves us are very positive.

Design and screen of the Samsung Galaxy Note10: Samsung Galaxy Note10: the S Pen is still its biggest differentiation

This Samsung Galaxy Note10 moves away, at first glance, from that image of a  giant smartphone that Samsung had us used to with the Note family. In fact, it  is quite comfortable  and it may even seem small compared to other  flagships. of the competition.

It has an  infinite screen taken to the extreme, with very pronounced curves that, however, do not hinder its handling. On the right side we find a completely smooth surface; On the right side we have the volume and screen lock buttons (holding it down activates Bixby). In the upper part we have the slot for the SIM card and, finally, in the lower edge we have the Type C charging port and the S Pen.

The rear part houses, in the upper left corner, the triple camera system with flash. To highlight the color of the unit that we are testing, a very original Aura Glow that has aroused opinions for all tastes but that, in any case, it is undeniable that it is a very striking color.

Missing? Indeed,  we do not have a headphone jack. 

The  6.3-inch screen and Corning Gorilla Glass 6 protection , has dispensed with the notch to put, instead, a punch hole camera  . This system has some detractors, but in this case the speed of facial unlocking, for example, is not impaired and allows us to make the most of the diagonal of the front.

It is a Dynamic AMOLED panel  and, as Samsung is accustomed to us,  the image quality is exceptional in any environment. The brightness level is insane, very good work, once again, by this manufacturer when it comes to mounting the panel.

Performance and battery, does it measure up?

The Samsung Galaxy Note10 comes, in its European version, with an  Exynos 9825 , the company’s own processor with 7 nm and a maximum clock frequency of 2.73 GHz. What do we translate this into? In practice,  the Note10 has made the grade at all times, both in multitasking and in other moments of greater demand (games, multimedia …). In our continuous tests of more than thirty minutes, we have not experienced heating problems, at least not notable problems. In some moments an increase in temperature has been perceived, but nothing remarkable.

It is accompanied by  8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of internal storage. More than enough.

We leave you below the results that AnTuTu has given us in this terminal.

Regarding the battery,  we have obtained 7 hours of screen on average . Not bad at all, although for a “Note” model we expected a little more slack. As a case, the fast charge (25W) is appreciated and leaves us a time of 50% in 30 minutes and 100% in 80 minutes.

It also has  12W wireless charging and 9W reversible charging. 

Connectivity, security and software

Samsung is one of the companies that takes care of the security section the most and offers us solutions such as  Knox or Pass. But, at the device level, what we know that users value the most is the reliability and speed of the on-screen fingerprint reader and facial recognition. In both cases,  both the fingerprint sensor and facial recognition have worked very quickly . In addition, you can activate or deactivate the fact that it unlocks you with your eyes closed. We have tested it both ways and it works great.

As for connectivity, nothing to reproach Samsung for:  dual band WiFi ax, Bluetooth 5.0, NFC, GPS, A-GPS, Radio, NFC, LTE …  In all our connection tests, they have been established without any mishap and with stability. In any case, the only one that we would have asked a little more for is bluetooth, which at certain times we perceive that it loses some coverage compared to tests in the same place with other devices.

Finally, regarding the  software we see an image wash thanks to  OneUI. Our unit has One UI 1.5 based on Android 9. A stable system, with good customization options and very visually pleasing. The gestures part needs to be polished a bit better, but we hope that this is already included in OneUI 2.0, which we hope will update soon.

S Pen in the Galaxy Note10: the jewel in the crown

So far, we are seeing quite a high-end content, which does not fail in anything but which is not surprising either. Except if we look at its lower edge, where it hides its ace up its sleeve: the S Pen . It is an accessory with which each one will interact in a way (there will be those who use it daily and others who leave it forgotten), but that we find  a very interesting extra .

This new generation not only helps us  to draw and take notes even with the screen turned off  (its precision is to be praised, by the way), it also works as a kind of  remote controller , to make gestures in the air and to activate the multimedia controls or the camera shutter, among others. We recommend that you follow the S Pen learning tutorial to get the most out of it, which is no small thing.

Photographic section, is it up to a premium range?

The Note10 is everything you can expect from a  high-end smartphone . It has a triple camera on the back formed by this configuration:

• 12 MP, f / 1.5-2.4, 27mm (wide), 1 / 2.55 ″, 1.4µm, Dual Pixel PDAF, OIS
• 12 MP, f / 2.1, 52mm (telephoto), 1 / 3.6 ″, 1.0µm, PDAF, OIS, 2x optical zoom
• 16 MP, f / 2.2, 12mm (ultrawide), 1.0µm, Super Steady video

On the front, there is a 10 MP, f / 2.2, 26mm (wide), 1.22µm, Dual Pixel PDAF.

We know that you want to see practical results beyond theory, so here are some images taken with the Samsung Galaxy Note10. All are uploaded without filters, but with the usual compression of our editor.

During the day it behaves quite well and we really like the treatment of the color that it does, very natural, but attractive enough so that we do not have to see the need to pass any filters.

At night , we see a lot of difference between using the automatic mode or the night mode. Here is a sample.

If we try to apply portrait mode to objects , the image is quite poorer. For its part, in close-ups the results are not bad at all, but they are quite far from other competing smartphones that incorporate a specific macro mode.

What about the zoom of the Samsung Galaxy Note10 ? It reaches 10 times, but suffers a lot at night. During the day we get pretty good results.

A point in favor is the  wide angle,  which enlarges the scene while maintaining correct image quality, both in day and night scenes.

Finally, the  portrait mode  is, once again if we talk about Samsung, one of the best on the market. Both the clipping and the blurring of the back, which, by the way, we can adjust to make it more or less intense, with specific shapes, softer or harder … The variety of options that it allows and how easy it is to go from one to another make it one of the best aspects of the terminal. In addition, we can also use the wide angle here, something really practical when we do  selfies.to ourselves. On the contrary, if you want to use the rear camera, you can use the S Pen as a grabber. Here we leave you, in this order, a photo with a rear camera with blur, a photo with a front camera without blur, a photo with a front camera with blur, and a photo with a front camera with blur with wide angle.

Technical characteristics of the Samsung Galaxy Note 10: Samsung Galaxy Note10: the S Pen is still its biggest differentiation