OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra: Which is the better flagship of the two?

Can the best from OnePlus take on the mammoth S20 Ultra?

OnePlus 8 Pro has been recently launched with a larger display, a powerful chipset, and some flagship features like IP rating, wireless charging, etc.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has been doing very well in the market with its massive display, a massive 108MP camera, and much more to offer at a much premium price.

Both are having powerful chipsets, an equally good set of cameras, and a higher refresh rate displays. Can the OnePlus 8 Pro with the cheaper price tag take on Samsung’s most established product or will the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra take the top spot for the best flagship smartphone?

Let’s find out in the full comparison and see which is the better of the two?

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Design:

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a massive display at 6.9 inches compared to the 6.78 inches display on the OnePlus 8 Pro. On the front, both have massive displays with punch hole cutout for the front cameras.

One thing to note that the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has the newer Gorilla Glass 6 compared to the Gorilla Glass 5 on the OnePlus 8 Pro for protection.

Both have different iterations as the OnePlus 8 Pro gets it to the top left corner and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra gets in the middle. The punch hole on the OnePlus 8 Pro looks better and does not interfere while gaming or watching a video.

The screen on the OnePlus 8 Pro is curved towards the sides whereas the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a flatter display instead of the curved display on the Samsung Galaxy S10 Plus. The waterfall display of the OnePlus 8 Pro looks attractive.

Both have minimum bezels to the sides where the OnePlus 8 Pro is curved slightly. At the back, both smartphones house different designs for the cameras.

All Samsung smartphones come with a rectangular module for the cameras and it is a similar design for the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra. The rectangular module has a massive 108MP camera and other cameras.

The OnePlus 8 Pro has the conventional central layout of its cameras with an LED flash. The back of the OnePlus 8 Pro has a frosted matte glass finish that does not catch fingerprints but the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a glossy back and does catch fingerprints (Both provide a plastic case inside the box).

On the sides, both get the volume controls and power button, but the OnePlus 8 Pro gets an alert slider and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra gets support for microSD card expansion which the OnePlus 8 Pro lacks.

Both smartphones get IP rating, support for wireless charging, and reverse wireless charging.

When it comes to handling, the OnePlus 8 Pro is easy to hold as it weighs at 199 grams which is around 23 grams lesser compared to the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra‘s 221grams.

Overall both the smartphones look and feel premium and it is all personal preference whether you like the flat display of the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra or the curved display of the OnePlus 8 Pro.

Check here: Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Review: Does the name Ultra make it the best of all smartphones in 2020?

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Display:

Both the OnePlus 8 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra have massive Quad HD+ displays (3168 x 1440 pixels) and come with AMOLED displays where OnePlus 8 Pro has a Fluid AMOLED display, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a Dynamic AMOLED display and there isn’t any much difference between the two.

Both come with a higher 120Hz display with a 240Hz touch sampling rate, but the OnePlus 8 Pro holds the edge as the 120Hz display can be used at both Quad HD+ and full HD+ resolution whereas, with the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra, you can use at full HD+ resolution only. This was mostly done to save battery life.

The brightness on both the displays is equally good but here the OnePlus 8 Pro has better visibility under sunlight. The OnePlus 8 Pro comes with a motion graphics processing feature during normal videos to higher refresh rate videos which is a good addition. The viewing angles are good for both of them.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra holds the edge with an ultrasonic fingerprint scanner where you can tap on the screen and unlock it which is better than the optical in-display fingerprint scanner on the OnePlus 8 Pro as you have to wake the screen to unlock it.

Both have face unlock but the one on the OnePlus 8 Pro is a bit faster. Both have support for Widevine L1 and support HDR contents.

Overall, the OnePlus 8 Pro holds the edge with the brighter display and the ability to use a 120Hz display at Quad HD+ resolution.

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Performance:

Both the OnePlus 8 Pro and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra sports the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 chipset and in some regions, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra gets the Exynos 990 chipset.

Both these chipsets are built on the 7nm process and power flagships of 2020. The Snapdragon 865 chipset is slightly superior to the Exynos 990 chipset when it comes to performance and battery life.

All the tasks are easily handled by both smartphones seamlessly. The OnePlus 8 Pro ships with 8/12GB RAM whereas the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra comes with a higher 12/16GB RAM and both have 128GB/256GB storage with UFS 3.0 speed reads/writes. The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a 512GB storage version also.

Both have a faster LPDDR5 RAM configuration compared to last year’s LPDDR4X.

Heavy games like PUBG Mobile, Call of Duty, etc run smoothly and seamlessly at the highest graphics settings with no stutter or lag on both smartphones. The 120Hz refresh rate on both of them makes the gameplay smoother for example Call of Duty supports a higher 120Hz refresh rate.

Coming to benchmarks, on Geekbench 5.1, the OnePlus 8 Pro scored 906 in Single-core score and 3374 in multi-core score which is slightly higher than the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra‘s 901 in the single-core score and 3245 in multi-core score.

Similarly, on Antutu v8 (which is a GPU intensive benchmark), the OnePlus 8 Pro scored 552128 which is higher compared to 493409 on the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.

Both are beasts when it comes to performance and gaming, but when it comes to benchmarks, the OnePlus 8 Pro scores better.

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Software:

The OnePlus 8 Pro comes with OxygenOS 10.5.8 built on top of Android 10 and as we all know OxygenOS is the best interpretation of Android as it provides a Stock Android-like experience with a tone of customizations and efficient memory management.

The OneUI 2.1 built on top of Android 10 on the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is also much more streamlined and provides some very interesting features on each update.

Both feature a system-wide dark mode, Android 10 navigation gestures, and a dedicated GameSpace for all the games. The OneUI 2.1 brings some improvements to the cameras, Samsung Pay for full-fledged payments, and Samsung in-built applications for usage.

The OxygenOS 10.5 brings the Google Feed instead of the Shelf, ceratin improvements to the battery, and some more. However, there is no Always-On display on the OnePlus 8 Pro as you have to tap the screen to view details.

Comparing both UI side by side, there is not any such difference, but the OxygenOS feels slightly better than the OneUI on the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Camera:

As far as cameras go, both the OnePlus 8 Pro and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra sport a quad-camera setup but the implementations on both are different. OnePlus 8 Pro comes with the new 48MP Sony IMX689 main camera compared to the 48MP IMX586 camera on earlier models, then it has the 48MP Sony IMX586 ultrawide camera, 8MP telephoto camera, and most interestingly a 5MP color filter camera.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has that massive 108MP Samsung ISOCELL HM1 main camera, 48MP telephoto camera with 100x space zoom, 12MP ultrawide camera, and a time of flight sensor for portraits.

Both have good details and dynamic range during the day. OnePlus seems to have improved the camera on the 8 Pro as the new 48MP Sony IMX689 has better details and improved low-light performance.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra holds a slight edge when it comes to colors and has better exposure in surroundings over the OnePlus 8 Pro.

At night, the images are a mixed result because, at outdoor conditions, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra takes better images with low noise compared to the OnePlus 8 Pro.

This doesn’t mean the OnePlus 8 Pro is far behind as the newer 48MP Sony IMX689 sensor is really good in taking images at night.

Both have their dedicated Night Modes, but the OnePlus 8 Pro‘s night mode seems to have been implemented very well over the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra resulting in images with good dynamic range and the OIS helps reduce a whole amount of noise.

Coming to the ultrawide camera, the OnePlus 8 Pro uses a 48MP Sony IMX586 camera with a 119-degree field of view whereas the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra gets a 12MP ultrawide camera with a slightly larger 123-degree field of view.

During daylight shots, both of them take an equally good amount of detail and the dynamic range also works well. The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a slightly wider aperture which captures many more details in the images and the colors look slightly more natural compared to the OnePlus 8 Pro.

But at night, the OnePlus 8 Pro captures better light and the images have much more detail compared to the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra. The dedicated Night Mode on the OnePlus 8 Pro is also better.

The biggest talking point for the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is its telephoto camera which can do 100x space zoom. The OnePlus 8 Pro, on the other hand, has an 8MP telephoto camera which can do 3x optical zoom.

Using the ultrawide camera:

Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra OnePlus 8 Pro

The images taken from both smartphones have a different appeal.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a better dynamic range and can achieve higher levels of zoom at 10x,30x, and can really go up to 100x which is insane. at 10x, the images have excellent detail and till 30x, the colors look good.

But at 100x, there is a loss of details as the colors look washed out and the images can be barely used at this resolution.

The OnePlus 8 Pro is good with 3x optical zoom and can go up to 10x zoom also. It depends personally whether you like the higher zooming capabilities or just the normal zoom.

The fourth camera is different on both of them. The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra gets a ToF camera that helps in portraits and adds depth in the images. The OnePlus 8 Pro has a 5MP color filter camera which is a sort of a gimmick.

The Color Filter camera as discussed in the review of the OnePlus 8 Pro, can look through objects and makes the images look washed out by adding photo chrome and X-Ray effects. OnePlus is working on an update to disable this camera.

The OnePlus 8 Pro can take some very good macro shots using its 48MP ultrawide camera which the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra cannot do.

However, with portraits, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is slightly better as the ToF provides better depth and proper edge detection compared to the OnePlus 8 Pro.

Coming to the front, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a massive 40MP camera which results in 10MP images by default. The OnePlus 8 Pro has the older 16MP front camera which is pretty good but does feel a bit old-schooled.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a better dynamic range and the skin tones look more natural compared to the images on the OnePlus 8 Pro. The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has better exposure in the background where the OnePlus 8 Pro simply overexposes resulting in slightly grainy images.

Portraits work well on both the front cameras.

In terms of video, both of them are capable of recording up to 4K@60fps but the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has support for 8K video recording at 24fps. However, this 8K video is a good addition but results in a loss in color compared to 4K video footage.

The OnePlus 8 Pro also takes really good videos with excellent dynamic range and the colors look punchier in the videos. The autofocus on the OnePlus 8 Pro‘s camera is better than that of the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.

Both have dedicated Steady Modes for videos and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra provides a tone of customizations when it comes to videos.
The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra also can support 4K video capture from the front camera whereas the OnePlus 8 Pro can only capture up to 1080p videos @ 30fps.

So overall, the cameras do feel a mixed result as the OnePlus 8 Pro has really good cameras and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has that massive 108MP sensor and higher zoom capabilities.

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Battery Life:

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a bigger 5000mAh battery compared to a 4510mAh battery on the OnePlus 8 Pro. This means the battery life is slightly better on the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra and plus the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra it pushes the 120Hz display at full HD+ resolution.

With normal usage, both smartphones easily for a day with the display set to 120Hz. With heavy gaming like playing PUBG Mobile continuously for 3-4 hours, streaming social media like Instagram or Facebook, with the display set at 60Hz, both lasted a day and a half.

The screen on time on both was hovering between 6-7 hours with the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra being a bit better with an extra 1 hour. The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra also has an Ultra Power Saving Mode which can make the smartphone go black and white and make use of essential features such as messaging, cameras, etc.

The newer OxygenOS 10.5.8 also brings certain improvements to the OnePlus 8 Pro.

Both the smartphones come with fast chargers bundled inside the box. OnePlus 8 Pro has the proprietary 30W Warp Charger and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra comes with a 25W fast charger.
Note that the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra can support up to 45W fast charging. For that, you have to buy that charger separately.

Coming to charging speeds, the OnePlus 8 Pro charges 0 to 67 percent in the first 30 minutes whereas the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra takes 0 to 55 percent in 30 minutes. The difference is very marginal.

When charging to 100 percent complete, the OnePlus 8 Pro takes 68 minutes whereas the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra takes 75 minutes which is slightly more, but we need to consider the 500mAh more battery capacity over the OnePlus 8 Pro.

The OnePlus 8 Pro comes with a new feature called Deep Battery customizations that efficiently charges the smartphone further.

For the first time in an OnePlus smartphone, there is support for wireless charging which the OnePlus users have been eagerly waiting for. It comes with a 30W Wireless Warp Charging which is faster than the 15W wireless charging on the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.

The OnePlus wireless charging pad takes the OnePlus 8 Pro from 0 to 50 percent in 30 minutes and has a fan built outside to radiate heat from the smartphone while charging and maintain the temperature while charging.

Both have the support for Wireless Power Share, but the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a slightly faster output at 9W compared to 3W on the OnePlus 8 Pro. Devices such as Galaxy Earbuds or other smartphones having this feature can charge by keeping on each of their backs.

Overall, in terms of battery life, both are equally good. Where the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a slight edge in terms of battery life, the OnePlus 8 Pro has faster charging and better battery optimization which gives it a slight edge over the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.

OnePlus 8 Pro vs Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra Audio Quality:

Both the OnePlus 8 Pro and the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra come with stereo speakers and have Dolby Atmos. Both have the loudspeaker vent at the bottom with the earpiece located on top of the display, which together provide a stereo effect.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a slightly better sound output compared to the OnePlus 8 Pro. The sound on the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has slightly higher bass levels and the sound seems good. The OnePlus 8 Pro has a lot to tweak within the audio settings and provides good sound overall.

Both lack a 3.5mm headphone jack, but the sound output through the USB port on both smartphones are good. But here, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra gets a slight edge overall with the audio output.

Verdict:

Choosing either of them will not be an issue as both are the best offerings from their brands. OnePlus 8 Pro is the best OnePlus smartphone made to date as it offers powerful hardware, much more refined software, and considerably better cameras.

The new features like IP rating, 30W Wireless charging, etc. make it a proper flagship. However, the color filter camera is a bit strange as such a camera was never seen in the smartphone industry.

On the other hand, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is a massive smartphone and truly defines the brand Samsung and raises word flagship to the next level. The massive 108MP camera with the other three cameras is excellent and the additional 100x space zoom is good for if you want larger zoom capabilities, but at that zoom, the images are not so good.

The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has a massive 5000mAh battery which gives it good battery backup.

Comparing both smartphones side by side, the OnePlus 8 Pro has a better display as it can use the 120Hz refresh rate at Quad HD+ resolution, then it has a newer and improved set of cameras, fast charging both wirelessly and wired also.

The OxygenOS feels smooth and easy to use over the OneUI thus providing better customizations.
The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra has better cameras over the OnePlus 8 Pro, better audio, and slightly better battery life.

Taking all things into consideration, the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is the ultimate flagship as it gets a great set of cameras, a powerful chipset with excellent battery life. Like the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra, it also comes with flagship features.

The OnePlus 8 Pro does all things right and a cheaper price tag offers much more compared to the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra.

The prices for the OnePlus 8 Pro starts at Rs.54999 for 8GB RAM and 128GB storage and Rs.59999 for the 12GB RAM and 256GB storage. The Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra is priced at a very premium Rs.97999 for the 12GB RAM and 128GB storage.

The OnePlus 8 Pro is cheaper compared to the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra and has a better display, comes with a powerful chipset, a good set of cameras and all flagship features like wireless charging, IP rating, etc.

So on an overall basis, the OnePlus 8 Pro edges by a slight margin over the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra and makes a value for money option to consider.