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Price: $649.99 | Size: 47mm | Compatibility: Android 12+
Samsung’s Galaxy Watch Ultra is the best Android smartwatch money can buy. But this is not a flawless watch, and it is not for everyone. If you are thinking about spending $650 on this thing, read this review once.
Design and Build: Tough, Heavy, and Unmistakably Inspired by Apple
The Galaxy Watch Ultra has a 47mm “squircle” (square-circle hybrid) case made from Grade 4 titanium. It looks premium. It also looks identical to the Apple Watch Ultra, which Samsung has not been shy about.
The titanium frame has real weight. At 60.1 grams, this watch is heavy. If you have smaller wrists or you are used to wearing something slim and lightweight, you will feel it during the first week. It also took me time to adjust.
The build quality is excellent. This watch is MIL-STD-810H certified, meaning it can withstand extreme temperatures (-20°C to 50°C), altitude, dust, vibration, and drops. You can take it underwater to a depth of 100 meters.
On the right side, there are three buttons. The large orange-accented “Quick Button” in the middle is customizable and can launch a workout, activate the flashlight, trigger water lock, or open any app you want. The two buttons above and below handle navigation, recent apps, Samsung Wallet, and powering the watch. The buttons click satisfyingly and are easy to press.
There is no rotating bezel. It was removed. If that was a feature you loved on older Samsung watches, you will not find it on the Galaxy Watch Ultra.
One important note on bands: the Galaxy Watch Ultra uses a Dynamic Lug push-button quick-release band system. Bands from the Galaxy Watch 8 and Galaxy Watch 8 Classic are NOT compatible.
Display: No Complaints Here
The 1.5-inch Super AMOLED display has a 480×480-pixel resolution and peaks at 3,000 nits of brightness. In direct sunlight, whether you are running through a park or cycling outdoors, you can read it clearly without shading the display with your hand. Plus, the sapphire crystal on the glass protects it from scratches.
The display colors are vivid, the contrast is sharp, and the always-on display works well, too. The touch response is fast and accurate. I have faced no issues using it, even during sweaty workouts.
The only nitpick some reviewers have raised, and I am also not a fan of, is that the 1.5-inch diameter stays the same as the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic, which feels like an unassertive choice for a “Ultra” flagship watch that costs $650.
Performance: Fast & Smooth
The Exynos W1000 chip inside the Galaxy Watch Ultra is a 3nm processor. Paired with 2GB of RAM, the watch runs everything smoothly. App switching, scrolling through tiles, jumping between a workout session and Spotify, running maps, none of it stutters.
The 64GB of onboard storage in the 2025 version is useful if you download offline music playlists, maps, and apps for phone-free use during outdoor activities. The 2024 one had 32GB.
Battery Life: Good for a Smartwatch, Not for a Sports Watch
Samsung claims 100 hours in Power Saving Mode, 48 hours in Exercise Power Saving Mode, and around 60 hours of regular use. In my usage, I was getting roughly 60 hours with features like continuous heart rate monitoring, sleep tracking, and daily GPS use. If you keep the AOD on, the battery life will fall to 48 hours.
For day-to-day smartwatch use, you should recharge it every 2 to 3 days.
If you are doing multi-day hiking trips or any activity that requires GPS tracking for 20+ consecutive hours, this watch will not survive.
Charging is another pain point. Going from nearly dead to 100% takes 2+ hours using the included wireless charging puck. So plan your charging windows accordingly.
One thing that was removed from the 2024 model onward: the Galaxy Watch Ultra no longer supports Wireless PowerShare, so you cannot top off the watch by placing it on the back of your Samsung phone. It is an inconvenience.
GPS: Very Good, Not Class-Leading
The Galaxy Watch Ultra uses dual-frequency GPS, combining L1 and L5 bands. This is the same setup found in Garmin’s GPS systems and the Apple Watch Ultra 2.
In open terrain, every GPS-enabled smartwatch performs similarly, with the differences being negligible. Where things diverge is in dense tree cover, urban canyons, and tight corners on trails. In those conditions, my independent six-month testing shows the Watch Ultra stays within approximately 5.1 meters of a calibrated GPS reference unit for roughly 91% of a route.
For the vast majority of runners and hikers, 5.1 meters of accuracy is completely fine. If you are navigating by precise bearings along a ridgeline or running pace-tight ultras where every GPS split drives your strategy, the Garmin is a better watch.
A practical feature built on top of GPS tracking is TrackBack, which lets you retrace your route back to your starting point. This is genuinely useful during trail runs and hikes. GPX route importing for turn-by-turn navigation was also added and works well through the Samsung Health app.
Software: One UI Watch 8 and Google Gemini
The 2025 Galaxy Watch Ultra comes with One UI Watch 8 running on Wear OS 6. The interface is clean, responsive, and well-organized. The new Multi-Info Tiles let you stack multiple health metrics on a single glance, reducing the need to scroll through individual tiles. The Now Bar feature, borrowed from Samsung’s Galaxy phone UI, surfaces context-aware controls on your watch face, such as media playback, timers, and active navigation.
Google Gemini replaces the older Google Assistant on this watch. You can give it multi-step voice commands like “start a 30-minute run and play my workout playlist,” and it handles both simultaneously. Complex queries sometimes returned vague responses to me, but for workout initiation, reminders, and quick questions, it is useful.
The app ecosystem on Wear OS is good. Third-party apps like Strava, AllTrails, Komoot, and Spotify work well and benefit from the dual-frequency GPS data. Samsung Pay via NFC works for tap payments. LTE means you can leave your phone at home and still make calls, stream music, and receive messages independently with the built-in eSIM.
One frustration worth noting is that Samsung still splits functionality across two separate apps on your phone: the Galaxy Wearable app for watch settings and Samsung Health for all fitness and health data. It works fine, but it adds a layer of friction that a single unified app could eliminate.
The Android-Only Limitation
If you use an iPhone, stop reading here. This watch does not work with iOS at all. There is no workaround.
Even within Android, the experience is two-tiered. Samsung Galaxy phone users get the complete feature set, including ECG, blood pressure, sleep apnea detection, Energy Score AI insights, and Bedtime Sync. Users with non-Samsung Android phones get most fitness-tracking features but lose access to health-specific capabilities. If you are planning to pair this with a Pixel, OnePlus, or another Android brand, go in with that expectation in mind.
Final Verdict
The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra (2025) is a very good smartwatch, but it’s aimed at a very specific audience. It is well-built, feature-dense, durable, and it delivers on GPS, health tracking, battery life, and performance in a way that no other Wear OS device currently matches.
The $649.99 price is real money, and it comes with genuine limitations such as ECG and blood pressure readings locked to Samsung phones, slow charging, a single large size, inconsistent automatic workout detection, and GPS that is strong but not Garmin-level in demanding conditions. It is also not a watch you buy if you want an understated design.
But if you are an Android user, specifically a Samsung phone user, who wants the best smartwatch available right now and is serious about outdoor activity or health tracking, this is the one. Just make sure you actually need an “Ultra” before spending $650 on one.
