Samsung Galaxy Note 8 review: Plans | Pricing | Specs

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Samsung very much needed the Galaxy Note 8 to succeed. Not just because of the colossal failure of the Galaxy Note 7 and whatever damage that had done to the brand, but also because it had set itself a very ambitious target with the Note 8.

The Galaxy Note 8 was the most expensive Android handset to go on sale in Australia at its time of launch, although it was rather easily eclipsed by the pricing of the iPhone X and the newer Galaxy Note9.

Still, pricing any smartphone at $1,499 outright is a bold move that speaks to what Samsung expected the Note 8 to do for consumers, especially considering that 2017 was an exceptional year for premium smartphone handsets.

The Note 8 even has to compete in-house with Samsung's own, less expensive but still premium Galaxy S8+ and Galaxy S8 handsets. So how does it compare?

Design

• "Infinity" curved display is just as attractive as it was in the Galaxy S8/S8+
• Large size is not exactly pocket-friendly

• Read more on the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 design

  You couldn't mistake the Galaxy Note 8 for any other handset on the market as its design is clearly the same design used on the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+, right down to the curved "infinity display". That infinity display means there's precious little in the way of bezels on this particular handset.

  Naturally, being a Note device, it packs a large screen – 6.3 inches with a resolution of 2960x1440 to be precise. Conforming to the style of Samsung's other 2017 handsets, it's using a 18.5:9 display, which means it's extra high rather than being both extra high and wide.

  For the purposes of comparison, here's how the Galaxy Note 8 compares to its predecessor, the Galaxy Note 5:

  

  And here's how it visually compares to the Samsung Galaxy S8:

  

  The aspect ratio of the Note 8's display doesn't make it any harder to hold in the hand than the Galaxy Note 5, but there's a slight downside to that additional height. That downside comes when you drop it into your pants pocket.

  The Note 8 provides a lot of phone height to have in your pocket. If I was wearing any kind of mildly tight or hip-hugging pants, I was nervous every time I sat down because I thought I was going to break either the handset or myself. If you're still rocking your 90s' Hammer pants you'll be fine, but those of us with tighter pockets may find it a challenge.

  One aspect of the Note 8's design, borrowed from the Galaxy S8, that I can't say I'm a fan of is the rear-mounted fingerprint sensor. It now has the flash between the sensor and the twin rear lenses, but it's still an annoying placement for quick fingerprint verification.

  As with the Galaxy S8, a case with ridged sides might make it easier to find in a pinch, but this is still a poor design. Other rear-mounted readers are placed under the lens, not right next to it, and that's a huge advantage for them. Testing with a Tech21 case did help with the fingerprint sensor issue, at the cost of making the Galaxy Note 8 even larger.

  

  Like the Galaxy S8 series, the glossy black of the Note 8's design is truly eye catching, but it's also very good at picking up fingerprints along the way. It's also a rather slippery design, so again a case would be advisable. The Note 8 is at least durable, with an IP68 rating for water resistance that means immersion in clean water is fine. Although it's slightly alarming to remove and insert the S-Pen while underwater because it forces air bubbles out the side of the handset itself.

  I'd still suggest a case for this or any premium smartphone. To its credit, Samsung will provide one free screen repair with its "Samsung Assure" program in Australia within the first 12 months, but that will still involve being without your handset while repairs are made.

Camera

• Dual-lens 12MP camera is a significant improvement over the Galaxy S8/S8+
• Plenty of customisation options for photography pros while still making basic photography a snap

• Read more on the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 camera

  The Galaxy S8 has a fine camera, but it's one that left me somewhat wanting because it was only a minor upgrade from the Galaxy S7 in a year where some exceptional dual-lens cameras have emerged. Even the single-lens game is stepping up by way of phones such as Sony's Xperia XZ Premium.

  Thankfully, Samsung stepped up with the Note 8, which featured the company's first entry into the dual-lens camera space. Specifically, the Note 8 packs dual 12Mp cameras at the rear, which can be used for wide, telephoto and bokeh-style portrait effects. Samsung refers to that latter functionality as "live focus", and it's the default camera mode when you open up the app.

  As with other virtual bokeh effects, there are limitations on distance and lighting that come into play, so if you're too far away or it's too dim, it won't be available. One nice factor here is that it's also adjustable after the fact. I quickly defaulted to using that method for all my live focus shots because it's easier to take the shot and edit later than messing around with sliders when you're also trying to frame and light a shot.

  The Dual Capture mode, where both lenses fire so you end up with a wide- and close-angle shot of your subject, also has some utility for those instances where your framing isn't quite right but you want the best possible resolution for your photo. It's also worth noting that the Note 8 will allow you to shoot in RAW mode if lots of post-production is your thing.

  The Note 8's rear cameras do feature different apertures, with the wide angle F/1.7 sensor being notably more sensitive than the telephoto F/2.4 camera. If you use the dual capture mode a lot, you'll quickly notice this because while it's possible to get some fine telephoto shots, the wide angle version is almost always going to be a little nicer. As such, if you're not averse to cropping for zoom, you can sometimes get better photos that way.

  The Note 8's camera array does deliver on Samsung's promises of top quality, even in low lighting situations. Here are some straight sample photos taken from the Note 8:

  

  Here's a low light shot taken on the Note 8:

  

  And by way of comparison, here's the same shot taken on the Galaxy S8:

  

  It's an interesting example because while the Note 8 has picked up more light, in doing so it's slightly washed out the image in a way the S8 didn't. That being said, you could easily modify the image within the Note 8's Gallery app to adjust for this.

  Here's a wide angle zoom lens shot of the Sydney Harbour:

  

  And here's the same shot through the telephoto lens:

  

  The front-facing camera is also entirely suitable for selfie work, including a range of comedy sticker effects to give your photos that extra bit of oomph at the cost of whatever dignity you might have once had:

  

  They're not quite animoji, but the effort is there.

Performance

• A powerful handset, but effectively identical to the Galaxy S8/S8+
• Pricier than most other smartphones of similar power

• Read more on the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 performance

  The Galaxy Note 8 runs on the same essential core as found in the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+, which is to say either a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 or Samsung's own Exynos 8995 CPU, with 6GB of RAM. Most benchmarks tend to suggest that the Exynos (which is the version we get in Australia) is a little better at power management, while the Snapdragon might offer slightly better performance, chewing up more juice as it goes.

  In any case, in a benchmark sense, it's interesting to note that while it's close, the Note 8 is edged out by both the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+ as well as by a number of other Snapdragon 835-equipped handsets.

  Handset	Geekbench 4 CPU Single Core (higher is better)	Geekbench 4 CPU Multi Core (higher is better)
  Samsung Galaxy S8+	2020	6690
  Samsung Galaxy S8	1989	6628
  Huawei P10 Plus	1863	6544
  Nokia 8	1932	6529
  OnePlus 5	1976	6506
  Samsung Galaxy Note 8	2024	6490
  HTC U11	1919	6362
  Sony Xperia XZ Premium	1908	6324
  Apple iPhone 7 Plus	3374	5649
  Huawei P10	1922	5633
  Apple iPhone 7	3452	5599
  Apple iPhone SE	2449	4171
  Google Pixel XL	1629	4051

  The Note 8 did outclass its siblings in 3DMark's Ice Storm Unlimited test, however:

  Handset	3DMark Ice Storm Unlimited Result
  HTC U11	40239
  Sony Xperia XZ Premium	40086
  OnePlus 5	39497
  Apple iPhone 7 Plus	37956
  Apple iPhone 7	37717
  Samsung Galaxy Note 8	32277
  HTC U Ultra	29968
  Apple iPhone SE	29276
  Huawei P10 Plus	28491
  Google Pixel XL	28458
  Samsung Galaxy S8	28409
  LG G6	28344
  Samsung Galaxy S8+	28120
  Huawei P10	25168

  Benchmarks are never the only measure of a phone's performance, but they're an interesting indicator of likely performance in a relative sense. There's little doubt that the Note 8 is a powerful phone, and at its asking price it should be, but that price is also something of a deterrent, simply because you don't have to cover its asking price to get similar or, in some cases, better performance than the Note 8. If you're keen on the other aspects of the Note 8, that may not matter, but it does mean that the Note 8 isn't quite the must-have premium device that other Notes have been relative to the market in previous years.

  Performance isn't just a matter of raw specifications, however. I've been critical in the past of Samsung's "Edge Display" feature, which lets you put common shortcuts onto a slide-out display for quick access. It's not a terrible feature, but it's always been a bit hit and miss for accurately sliding out, and it essentially adds steps to shortcuts you could place on your home screen anyway.

  The Galaxy Note 8's new party piece here is what Samsung calls "App pairing", which uses Android 7.1.1's dual screen multitasking capability to launch any two apps you choose simultaneously. It's not a must-have feature, but it does at least make sense of that larger display screen. I suspect over time, as I've done with the Galaxy S8, I'll disable the Edge Display entirely, but your experience may vary.

  The Note 8 is launching with Android 7.1.1, rather than the newer Android 8.0 (Oreo) as well as Samsung's own TouchWiz UI. Samsung has generally toned down TouchWiz as the years have gone by, but in the current climate where many handset makers barely alter stock Android at all, it stands out as still having more of its own in-house software than most.

  Samsung Pay is obviously present via NFC, but there's also Samsung Health as well as the Galaxy Apps and the specific S-Pen apps that pop into view when you take the S-Pen out. As with any Android handset, you can customise the experience to suit your own style, whether it's heavy on the widgets or simply app shortcuts. Here the Galaxy Note 8's larger display helps a lot simply because it gives you more space to personalise the Android experience to suit your desires.

Battery life

• Among the longest-lasting premium smartphones currently available
• Can't match the longevity of the Galaxy S8+, however

• Read more on the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 battery life

  Samsung had to tread very carefully with the battery in the Galaxy Note 8 simply due to what happened with the Galaxy Note 7 battery. It's taken the interesting step of walking battery capacity backwards a little, with a sealed 3,300mAh battery inside the Note 8. That means that for the first time ever, a member of the Galaxy S series has a larger battery because the Galaxy S8+ sports a 3,500mAh battery pack.

  Using Geekbench 3's older battery test showed the Note 8 to be a capable performer for a device with a screen this large, ending up in the top echelon of battery performance for phones we've tested. Here's how it compares against the leading flagship phones:

  Handset	Geekbench 3 Battery Test Duration	Geekbench 3 Battery Score
  Galaxy S8+	14:55:30	8955
  Nokia 8	12:22:10	7421
  Sony Xperia XZ Premium	12:06:40	7266
  BlackBerry KEYone	12:05:00	DNF
  Samsung Galaxy Note 8	12:00:50	7208
  Motorola Moto Play Z 2	11:50:50	7107
  Samsung Galaxy S8	11:47:50	7078
  HTC U11	11:42:40	7026
  Apple iPhone 7 Plus	11:11:20	6713
  Huawei P10 Plus	10:39:50	6218
  OnePlus 5	9:33:30	5735
  Huawei P10	9:31:30	5523
  Google Pixel XL	9:14:20	5543
  LG G6	9:09:30	5495
  Oppo R11	7:52:30	4725
  Apple iPhone 7	7:50:10	4701
  Apple iPhone SE	4:27:10	2671

  The Galaxy Note 8 has a pretty easy claim on all-day battery life, given Geekbench 3's test is a linear test, and my own anecdotal testing backs this up. It's not quite up there with the Galaxy S8+, but it's still good.

S-Pen

• A handy tool for taking notes and annotating documents on the fly

• Read more on the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 S-Pen

  A Note simply isn't a Note without its stylus. Years after the original Note's debut, very few competitor brands have even opted for an included stylus with their large screen phones. The S-Pen that comes with the Note 8 has been subtly refined with what Samsung claims is a more responsive and accurate stylus tip as well as with a few software tweaks to make it a better productivity tool.

  

  Note users, in my experience, either fall into the camp of always using the S-Pen or the camp of never even giving it a second thought beyond clicking it out once to make sure it's there when they unpack their shiny new handsets.

  Obviously, if you're in the latter camp you won't care, but the former should find the new S-Pen quite workable for annotations, sketching and taking multiple notes on the Note 8's always-on display. This includes animated messages, which aren't massively productivity centric, but they're fun for a limited while. Something tells me the more serious Note users will take a glance once and never return.

  Samsung has also beefed up the Note 8's translate ability. Where the Note 7 could manage language translations with a tap, this was one word at a time, which is a horribly clumsy way to parse any sentence. You now have the option to capture whole paragraphs at once and have them run through Google Translate into a wide variety of languages.

  As always, that needs a present data connection to work, and it's operating as mechanical translation so some nuances of language won't always come through. Still, in a pinch it should suffice to order you a taxi or a meal in foreign climes. It would still be unwise to sign a legally binding contract based on its translation, however.

Verdict

• Undeniably one of the best smartphones Samsung has made
• Also one of the most expensive

• Read our full Samsung Galaxy Note 8 verdict

  The challenge that the Note 8 has to face isn't, as some may put it, overcoming any issues related to battery fires because Samsung's more or less proven its battery technology with the Galaxy S8, and the Note 8 is essentially a larger, stylus-equipped version of those handsets. I can offer no personal guarantees, but Samsung appears to have learned its lesson there, at least on surface examination.

  However, the Note 8 does have to face the challenge of justifying its $1,499 purchase price, and that's a big challenge that, despite its very evident quality, will decide whether this is the phone you should buy.

  Firstly, if you're enamoured of the S-Pen and its approach, then it's not only an obvious choice, but your only choice outside of tracking down a now-ageing Galaxy Note 5. While the improvements to the S-Pen aren't immense, this is still the finest stylus-based phone on the market bar none...but then there aren't any others to compare against anyway!

  However, take the S-Pen out of the equation, and it's a tougher call.

  In straight line performance and battery life terms, it's comparable (and in some cases a little below) the performance of the far more pocket-friendly Samsung Galaxy S8 or Samsung Galaxy S8+, both of which are cheaper handsets on either outright or contract terms.

  There's no shortage of quality Android performers in the market right now, from the bargain position of the OnePlus 5 up through to the Nokia 8, LG G6, HTC U11 or Sony Xperia XZ Premium. Any of those phones could be in your pocket along with a fair chunk of change against the purchase price of the Note 8 because they're all markedly cheaper.

  That, to me, suggests that the Note 8 is a niche play for a specific set of users.

  If you love the whole Note ecosystem with the S-Pen, it's for you, especially as your Note 5 or earlier will easily be eclipsed by its performance. If you're performance-centric, it's a solid option, especially paired with the DeX dock, but as noted in its review, that's not quite the desktop solution Samsung thinks it is. If you're in the wider market for Android handsets, I'd compare carefully, even if you want to stay within the Samsung family of Galaxy handsets.

Pricing and availability

• Price: ~$1,100
• Where to buy: eBay

Specifications

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