Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review: Big, beautiful and bloody expensive

Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is, in a word, a beast. Just like last year’s Tab S10 Ultra, this year’s version has a stunning 14.6-inch display, impressive power and battery and a really nice slimline design.

In fact, this is Samsung’s slimmest tablet ever at just 5.1 mm thick. To make this year’s model even more attractive, Samsung has updated the S-Pen’s design and refreshed the DeX platform to make the S11 Ultra even more versatile as a productivity machine.

But there’s a catch. With a starting price of $2,099, this tablet is comparatively expensive. Especially when you consider that for the most part, Android is quite average as a tablet operating system.

Samsung does its best to overcome this, but for me, the balance between price and functionality just isn’t there with the S11 Ultra. It’s a really nice product, but it’s just not worth the asking price.

What makes the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra stand out?

If you’re after a large-screen tablet, you won’t find nicer than the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra.

The 14.6-inch screen on this Android device is stunning. Samsung’s Dynamic AMOLED 2X displays have been some of the most stunning looking screens on smartphones and tablets for a long time, but there’s something special about the larger 14.6-inch size.

The stunning display is matched by the stunning design. While last year’s Tab S10 Ultra was a slimline beauty at 5.4 mm, Samsung has shaved 0.3 mm off the thickness this year to make the S11 Ultra its slimmest tablet ever.

Arguably, you won’t notice the difference in the hand. I didn’t get the chance to hold them side by side, but 0.3 mm is not a lot of depth in a tablet. Rest assured, the S11 Ultra feels sleek and thin.

Naturally, there’s the annual specs bump as well here, with the S11 Ultra powered by the new 3 nm MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ chipset, while a refreshed construction using aluminium improves resistance to scratches and dents.

But the bigger improvements here are updates to Samsung’s DeX platform, that makes the tablet better for productivity purposes – though to really get the most out of this, you need the keyboard case, which isn’t included in the box.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra tablet specs

Design and build quality

The Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra looks remarkably similar to the S10 Ultra from last year, but Samsung has done a fair bit this year to make the S11 Ultra a more robust device.

The body is made from a premium aluminium, with a thinner design than any other Samsung tablet in history. Sure, at 5.1 mm it’s only 0.3 mm thinner than last year’s model, but the record still stands.

It looks and feels like a premium device, and is rated IP68 for water and dust resistance this year.

At 692 grams, it’s light enough to pop in your bag without feeling weighted down, despite the fact there’s an 11,600 mAh battery inside.

14.6 inches of screen is a lot, though, and in a tablet it can almost be too much. The Tab S11 Ultra works in landscape and portrait orientation, but I found it too big to comfortably hold in one hand regardless of orientation.

You can better manage this with a good case, but for this particular review, I had to manage the device on its own.

There aren’t many buttons to manage on the tablet. A power button and a volume rocker on the top/right-hand side of the tablet (depending on which way you have it oriented). In vertical orientation, the power button was below the volume rocker, and I found myself expecting to find them the other way around for some reason.

Samsung has popped a 12MP ultra-wide camera in the front of the tablet, and a twin 13MP + 8 MP camera array in the back of the tablet. Those rear cameras do protrude a bit off the back, making the tablet slightly uneven when resting on a flat surface, but not so much that it slides around or rocks uncontrollably.

This year, Samsung has updated its bundled S-Pen, giving it a new hexagonal design that feels like an old 2B lead pencil in your hands.

The S-Pen is light and comfortable to hold and use, and magnetically attaches to the top/side of the tablet. Like last year’s model, though, the magnetic attachment is a bit insecure for my liking. In the course of this review, I lost the S-Pen down between the couch cushions at least twice when it had been attached to the tablet.

For all the tablet’s thinness, I would prefer a more secure connection for the S-Pen, like the 12-inch Surface Pro’s Surface Pen.

Samsung does sell cases and a keyboard case for the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra, though I didn’t get to test them out for this review. Which is a pity because I feel the huge screen cries out for a keyboard to really take advantage of the processor’s power.

The keyboard cover for the S11 Ultra costs $399, while the standard book cover is $199. I’ll come back to these prices later on.

Display performance

If Samsung has a superpower, it’s in its Dynamic AMOLED 2X display technology.

The Tab S11 Ultra has a 14.6-inch panel with a 2960 × 1848 resolution, and it looks gorgeous. It can display 16 million colours, and looks fantastic when doing anything from gaming to watching Netflix.

It’s also super bright, with a peak brightness level of 1,600 nits, and thinner bezels than last year that make the screen dominate your impressions of the tablet.

For watching Netflix or YouTube, the larger screen size shines. The picture is vibrant, easy to see, and offers plenty of detail and contrast. I watched the first episode of The Witcher on Netflix and the opening swamp scene offered plenty of detail, even when the screen was darkened.

The smaller bezels do work against the tablet for this use case, though. I found my fingers or thumb continually covering small portions of the screen as I just tried to hold the tablet. It’s a minor quibble, but I do wish the tablet had either an integrated stand or a cheap case in the box.

As a tablet, the touchscreen works well, but I did enjoy using the S-Pen. It works well for handwriting notes, though unlike writing on a device like the Kindle Scribe, it does feel like dragging a stylus over glass.

But it’s responsive enough to use for art work – not that I’m an artist by any stretch of the imagination, but I did have a bit of fun colouring in using the S-Pen.

It lets you get in nice and close for precise work, and the palm rejection works well.

Performance and software

Samsung has shifted the Tab S11 Ultra to use the new 3 nm MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ chipset, which delivers the goods.

From a benchmark perspective, you can see a significant jump up over last year’s model:

A big part of moving to this chipset is to enable better AI functionality. Samsung has been pushing hard with its AI integration all year across its product families, and the S11 Ultra lets you easily access Google Gemini, as well as use the generic writing and image generation functions.

I find very little use in these features, but they do work on the tablet.

More interesting this year is the update to Samsung’s DeX platform that lets you connect to an external monitor to use it as a proper laptop replacement.

I’m a big fan of DeX in Samsung’s smartphone lineup, and I think it has potential in the S11 Ultra.

I tried plugging the tablet into the espresso Displays 15 Pro, but the first hurdle was that the tablet couldn’t export enough juice to power the monitor. With a secondary power source, that was overcome, and Samsung turned the Tab S11 Ultra’s14.6-inch display into a gigantic trackpad.

You can definitely make the S11 Ultra work as in a dual monitor setup using DeX, but by default, Samsung makes the tablet a trackpad. I found that odd.

It also highlights that to make the S11 Ultra a useful device for productivity, you need to invest in accessories.

You can pair a wireless keyboard and mouse to the tablet, but you still need some form of case to be able to stand the tablet up so you can see it. That means a significant investment in addition to the significant asking price for the cheapest version of this tablet.

And then, finally, there’s Android. Android is not really designed for tablet-based productivity, though there are some suitable apps. Which have dedicated tablet versions. But I have found that many simply scale the phone’s app out to a much larger screen, which looks terrible.

For a $2,000+ device, I hate that app optimisation is a bit of a lucky dip.

Battery life and connectivity

Samsung has packed a huge 11,600 mAh battery inside the frame of the S11 Ultra, and it lasts for ages. That’s a bit bigger than last year’s 11,200 mAh battery, which is impressive given the S11 is slimmer as well.

While that large battery should get you through a day of watching Netflix without any concerns, there are a few other things to be aware of. First off is that fact that despite the fact you need to spend a minimum of $2,099 to buy this tablet, there’s no wall charger in the box.

Second of all is that even though the Tab S11 Ultra supports 45W fast charging with a compatible charger, you need to spend an additional $84 to buy the fast charging wall plug.

This feels like Samsung is having a laugh at its customers expense. I understand the environmental impacts of supplying a wall charger for phones, especially when most modern phones are all pretty standard with charging speeds (and many support wireless charging).

But for a $2,000 tablet that only offers fast charging with a compatible charger most people won’t have, Samsung has to be joking.

Beyond that, the tablet has a pretty wide range of connectivity options. There’s a Wi-Fi and a 5G version, and both support Bluetooth 5.4 and Wi-Fi 7.

All wired connectivity is done through the single USB-C port, so if you wanted to charge the device and use an external monitor, for example, you would probably be all out of luck, unless the monitor offered 2-way charging.

Verdict

I just don’t know who the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is for.

It’s a fine device, with plenty of power and a stunning design. It has been a long, long time since Samsung has released a product that wasn’t aesthetically pleasing and functionally sound.

But at $2,099, the Tab S11 Ultra prices itself beyond the realms of most tablet users. By the price tag alone, it needs to be geared towards professional users looking for a workplace powerhouse.

But Android just isn’t the best platform for tablet productivity. Even Apple separated iPadOS and iOS because it realised the needs of the larger screen are different to a smartphone.

Then there are the required accessories if you truly want to take advantage of this. I didn’t get to test the S11 Ultra with the keyboard attachment, but I do think it would have changed my outlook on the possibilities.

Having the keyboard accessory as an optional accessory is one thing. But the lack of a wall charger with a device that costs a couple of grand really feels like Samsung is taking advantage of its potential customers.

Buy the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra if:

• You have a lot of money lying around
• You want an exceptionally large, vibrant screen on a tablet
• You want a tablet with processing power and battery life

Skip the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra if:

• You are after value for money
• You don’t like losing your stylus between the couch cushions
• You need a device for a level of productivity Android apps can’t deliver

Where to buy

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is available now in Grey for both Wi-Fi and 5G versions. There are 256 GB, 512 GB and 1 TB capacities available.

Here’s what the pricing looks like across variants:

You can buy the tablet from the following retailers:

• Amazon
• The Good Guys
• Mobileciti
• Samsung
• JB Hi-Fi
• Officeworks
• Costco
• Harvey Norman
• Telstra
• Optus
• Vodafone

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