For over a decade, Samsung’s Note Ultra line set the standard for what a true flagship phone should be. The Note20 Ultra, in particular, felt like the peak of that vision: a squared, boxed design, sharp lines, a commanding presence in the hand, and the kind of premium weight and finish that instantly justified its position at the top of the market. It looked and felt like no other phone. It was unmistakably Samsung.
Unfortunately, the newer Ultra models have strayed far from that legacy. The design language has shifted to rounded corners, softer edges, and a thinner profile — all of which may appear more “consumer-friendly,” but in reality strip away the character and premium aura that made the Note special. In the hand, these rounded designs feel less distinctive, less professional, and, frankly, closer to an iPhone clone than the proud Samsung identity the Note once carried.
The obsession with making devices thinner has become a real problem. Thinner phones often come at the expense of key features and usability:
No expandable SD card slot — once a defining Note feature, this was a complete necessity for power users managing large files, professional media, or extended travel.
Reduced flushness and increasing camera bulk — each generation, the camera notches protrude further, breaking the phone’s symmetry and making it awkward to place on a table.
Loss of substance — the boxed, commanding build of the Note20 Ultra felt premium; the newer models feel fragile, lighter, and less purposeful.
A thicker phone is not a flaw. In fact, many users would much prefer a device that embraces thickness if it meant:
Larger batteries,
More advanced cooling,
A flush camera system,
And the return of expandable storage.
The Note20 Ultra now feels like the last truly high-level flagship — a phone that embodied Samsung’s boldness, innovation, and respect for professional users. Since then, each iteration seems to have moved away from that heritage, chasing trends of minimal weight and rounded aesthetics at the cost of functionality and identity.
This isn’t just about specs. For many long-time Note users, it’s personal. The Note series once represented Samsung’s commitment to making the best device possible — not the thinnest, not the most Apple-like, but the most powerful and versatile tool in a professional’s pocket. If Samsung continues down the path of compromise, there is a real risk of alienating its most loyal base.
Samsung has always been at its best when it led, not when it followed. If the company doesn’t realign with the principles that made the Note legendary — boxy, powerful, premium, feature-packed — it risks a complete fallout among those who once championed it the most.
@Ruffles1 I had a Note 20. It was certainly a good phone.
Now I have a Fold 7. The Fold is a great phone and proof of Samsung's challenging technology and pushing boundaries.
Samsung follows the user data. Only a minority of users that have devices with SD slots actually used those slots. The majority of those users installed small SD cards so it wasn't really worth the effort.
I think the major reason that the camera bump is noticeable is that the phones have become thinner. That and adding optics to add larger zoom to the cameras.
I see your point about Samsung pushing boundaries with the Fold 7, but I think it’s important to refocus the discussion on the Note Ultra series, which arguably represents the pinnacle of Samsung’s design philosophy before some questionable compromises.
Regarding the camera bump: in the Note Ultra series, the effect is much more pronounced precisely because the phones were made thinner while simultaneously integrating increasingly sophisticated optics. It’s a simple, almost self-evident reality: if you insist on making a phone thinner, the camera must stick out more to accommodate high-quality sensors and zoom lenses. Pursuing thinness for its own sake, as Samsung has done in recent years, seems more aesthetic than practical.
As for SD cards, the idea that only a minority of users ever utilized them is misleading. The Note Ultra series and other past devices show that SD cards were widely used—for additional storage, media management, backups, and transferring files between devices. Claiming that small SD cards rendered the feature redundant overlooks how integral expandable storage was to many users’ experience.
The expandable memory and the integrated bluetooth stylus were major factors in my purchase of the note 20 5g ultra. The newer phones have a regular stylus and not the same functionality. And no expandable memory.
