It kind of started at CES 2024, but we were clued in when Qualcomm first announced the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 and its stable diffusion/AI capabilities. Now, arguably the most high profile smartphone release to start the year is going all-in on AI too. This is the Samsung Galaxy S24 Series. 

In a pre-briefing we attended ahead of the launch. We were given a glimpse of what the Galaxy S24 Series can do now that it has equipped itself with “AI abilities.” 

Yes, we saw the entire Galaxy S24 line and it’s still the trio we know and love: Galaxy S24 Ultra, Galaxy S24+, and Galaxy S24. And while there are some minor changes looks-wise, casual observers likely won’t be able to tell the difference. 

That’s probably the reason why the focus is on what it can do and how it can help its prospective new users. 

Specifically, the AI features showcased were: Circle to Search, Live Call Translate, AI Summarize, and Photo Assist. 

Circle to Search

If you’re familiar with Google Lens, Circle to Search essentially does the same thing but more precise. 

So, you take an image – it can be a photo you took, any image from the internet, what have you. With the S Pen (on the Galaxy S24 Ultra) or just your fingers, you encircle the particular item that caught your eye. Immediately after, search results will be pulled up based on that item on the image. 

This has plenty of applications from research all the way to shopping. 

Live Translate

This is one of the more fascinating applications of AI on the Galaxy S24 Series. You need to enable this in the call settings first. And based on our brief experience, the number you’re calling has to be a saved contact. 

When enabled, before you start the call, the phone will explain that live translations are turned on to set the expectation of both parties on how the call will go. Both people on each end of the line have to patiently take turns speaking.

We tried it ourselves and it worked surprisingly well even with our broken Korean pronunciations.

Live translate works outside of the call too. The translation is baked into the default keyboard and is also available as a live interpreter when you’re out and about in your travels.

Right now, only 13 languages are supported including English, Spanish, Korean, and Japanese. 

AI Summarize 

This is another AI function that many might already be familiar with. After all, it was such a big talking point in the academic community when ChatGPT first gained popularity. 

With this, you can take any article off the web and distill it to a handful of organized bullet points. But you have to do this on the Samsung Notes app. It’s the only pre-installed app that supports the function. 

Additionally, Samsung’s native recording app also has the ability to transcribe and then summarize an entire recording. Samsung says it’s smart enough to determine how many people are speaking in the recording and summarize it accordingly. 

It’s a great tool with many applications which include gathering minutes of meetings and a godsend for journalists who constantly conduct interviews. 

Photo Assist 

This is another one of those features that exist in the wild but is now coming to Samsung Galaxy. Photo Assist takes image editing to the next level both by adding and subtracting to your existing photos. 

If you’re familiar with the erase function on Google Photos/Google Pixel, this is essentially that. And really, this feature has been around for quite some time. This helps you touch up photos and remove unwanted elements in the image. 

The next level is image generation. Perhaps you’ve seen examples of this tool circulating in TikTok or Reels. What it does is it takes an existing image and then expands it in a manner that makes sense for the image. It’s hard to explain in words but it’s adding things that aren’t there at first and generating an entirely new image with your base photo as the core. 

All-In on AI

These are just the headline AI features highlighted by Samsung. With the nature of AI, it’s not improbable to think that this can expand even further, adding tools and features throughout its existence. 

Galaxy S24 Series specs

For the hardcore techies, these are the specs you’re looking for. It’s worth noting that the Galaxy S24+ and Galaxy S24 will come equipped with Exynos 2400 for Galaxy instead of Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. 

Price and availability details to follow.