Samsung Galaxy S25 Vs S25 Plus: Specs Compared (RAM, Storage, & More)

In January 2025, Samsung held its annual Unpacked show in San Jose California. We were on hand to get a look at the devices launched up close. Since then, we reviewed the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra and found it to be an overall excellent phone, if a bit lacking in design originality. Well, Samsung launched two other phones that day, the Samsung Galaxy S25 and the Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus.

Immediately after my review of the Galaxy s25 Ultra, I switched over to the Galaxy S25 Plus to see how Samsung's other phones stacked up. Not everyone can nor should try to afford the top tier phone — often one of the smaller siblings will give you everything you need. So that's why I wanted to try them out. I've spent the last two weeks on Samsung's other two phones, the vast majority of my time was spent on the Galaxy S25+ sample provided by Samsung, but I was also able to spend a couple of days on a Galaxy S25 sample provided by T-Mobile. So now that I've spent some extra time with those, here's what you'll get if you decide not to go with the flagship.

Both of the phones share the S25 Ultra's lack of design changes. In fact, one could argue that the changes here are even fewer since the S24 and S24+ both already had rounded edges. The phones are both lighter than their predecessors at 162 grams and 190 grams respectively. Buttons, trays, and ports are all the same. The sole exception comes from the speaker grille which was a grille on the S24 and is a slot on the S25.

The Samsung Galaxy S25 sports a 6.2-inch AMOLED screen in a 146.9 x 70.5 x 7.2 mm frame. The S24 Plus has a 6.7-inch display in a 158.4 x 75.8 x 7.3 mm frame. Those screen sizes are the same from last year, though the phones are a bit slimmer from last year.

The real changes come on the inside. All Samsung S25 and S25 Plus phones sport Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy processor — there are no Exynos versions to be found anywhere. Like the S25 Ultra, Qualcomm and Samsung worked hand-in-hand to develop this new processor. What that amounts to in sheer raw power is debatable. The point is, you get all the power you could possibly want. The only key specification difference when it comes to internals are the batteries, which we'll discuss later, and the fact that the base s25 has a 128 GB storage options. The S24 Plus starts at 256 GB.

Both phones ship with One UI 7 which is based on Android 15. The biggest software change comes from the app launcher which, if you sort apps alphabetically come in a vertically scrolling app drawer. "Custom" sorting still gives you the horizontal scroller of old, but my goodness the vertical scroller is where it's at and thank you Samsung.

Another huge change is Gemini activating on the side button. Gemini is becoming smarter and more useful which is a relief to be honest. Now Gemini can do multi-step actions and tie directly into apps. Initially it's only tied into Google apps, but the potential is there down the road for Gemini to start being able to work within some apps. Right now, you can have Gemini look up something on the internet and write it down in a note for you in Google Keep or Samsung Notes.

The Daily briefs still leave something to be desired. I had hoped that my initial experience with the briefs was not great because the AI hadn't learned enough about me to know what I wanted to hear about. The plus side is, I get fewer political stories, but the briefing still doesn't show me much.

The batteries are the same from generation to generation — 4,000 mAh for the S25 and 4,900 mAh for the S25 Plus. The key difference is, this time around, this phone just lasts and lasts. I fell ill during my time with the Galaxy S25 Plus, so much of my time was spent at home on Wi-Fi, but I did have a couple of days spent at the Chicago Auto Show. Even on those days, the phone was easily a two-day phone.

I will grant you that I do not game as much as some, however I did spend a lot of time at the Auto Show on my phone, especially taking photos, which can be equally taxing to a phone's endurance. Regardless, the S25+ lasted for two days easily with some left over afterward.

That's a delightful surprise — previous models were no slouches in that department, but this is the first time a non-Ultra phone has actually been pretty great.

As for performance, the phone is right on par with the S25 Ultra, which is to say it's awesome. The only difference comes in the size of the vapor chambers for cooling on the inside of the phone which help keep the processor cool, but until you start exporting 4K video or playing extremely demanding games, you won't notice one way or another.

The cameras on the S25 and the S25 Plus are identical, and they're the same as on the phones last year. Those cameras are a 50-megapixel main camera, 12-megapixel ultrawide camera, and a 10-megapixel telephoto camera this year adds Google's Best Face AI algorithm to the mix, but that's basically it for the differences between these two phones.

Very much like last year, these cameras are quite good when the lighting complies. Even when you move indoors, the cameras still perform quite well. The one issue they have is with motion, such as Subaru's puppies at the Chicago Auto Show. Some of my photos of those adorable hounds didn't look amazing since they were moving, but overall, those are the exceptions, not the rules. Similarly, video in good light is really great and smooth from the front and the back cameras.

Adam Doud/SlashGear

At night, a lot of these characteristics take a hit, most especially in the video department. Even video shot while standing still (as opposed to walking) was subject to grain, even in the light-colored areas. The main camera will get you good results, and if your subjects stay perfectly still, good photos are possible, but if any of those factors are not present, your photos will suffer.

Both of these phones are available worldwide from a variety of brick-and-mortar stores, online stores, Samsung.com, Amazon, and most carriers. You can buy them anywhere which is a big part of the reason why they're so popular.

The phones are prices at $799 and $999 respectively. Normally, I'd recommend the S25+ and if you asked me to here, that would be my recommendation, but it's only because I didn't have nearly enough time with the base S25 to form a really good opinion. Again, most of my time was spent with the S25 Plus, and my time with it was quite enjoyable. In more than a few ways, like the cameras, the S25 Ultra is the superior phone, but I don't think you would get too much of a "lesser" experience if you went with either of the others. They are both quite capable and fun to use.