Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S8 series is just a few weeks away from its grand debut alongside the Galaxy S22 series. But unsurprisingly for an upcoming Samsung gadget, a comprehensive leak (via WinFuture) has spilled the beans on everything there is to know about the three flagship tablets. At the top of the food chain is the Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra, while the two mainstream offerings are the standard Galaxy Tab S8 and its Plus variant.
ContentsGalaxy Tab S8 Ultra
Starting with the top-of-the-line Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra, it’s one giant tablet, thanks to a huge 14.6-inch (2960 x 1848 pixels) OLED display that pushes it straight into the 2-in-1 category. The screen offers a 120Hz refresh rate, with a layer of Gorilla Glass 5 on top to keep scratches at bay. At its heart is Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 system on a chip, paired with a generous 16GB of RAM and up to 512GB of onboard storage. Interestingly, Samsung is retaining the microSD card slot for storage expansion.
Aside from its ginormous footprint and beefy innards, what stands out about the Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra is the notch. And since no sane person would be using this hulking glass-and-metal slab in portrait orientation for a long time, the notch has been positioned at the top with landscape usage in mind. After all, when paired with a folio keyboard case, the 14.6-inch screen turns it very much into an Android 12-powered laptop replacement. Rumors suggest that the 2022 iPad Pro refresh might get the notch treatment as well.
The notch houses two cameras (12-megapixel primary and 12-megapixel ultrawide), and there are an equal number of snappers at the back as well, including a 13-megapixel main and 6-megapixel ultrawide. The battery inside is rated at 11,200 mAh with support for fast charging. It also features 5G ,four Dolby Atmos-ready stereo speakers, and an S Pen.
For folks intrigued about the asking price, WinFuture throws out a rough estimate of between 1,140 and 1,220 euros, which translates to around $1,300 to 1,400 based on current conversion rates. Needless to say, it’s going to be one pricey tablet that squarely targets the M1-powered iPad Pro, but with some extra screen real estate in tow.
Galaxy Tab S8 and S8 Plus
As for the Galaxy Tab S8 and Tab S8 Plus, their specifications are almost identical, save for the screen size and battery. The vanilla Galaxy Tab S8 offers an 11-inch panel (2560 x 1600 pixels), while the Plus model sports a 12.7-inch OLED (2800 x 1752 pixels) screen. The 120Hz screen refresh rate tech is shared across both the models, and so are the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, 8GB of RAM, and 128/256 GB storage with further room for expansion.
The rear camera hardware is nearly identical to that of the Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra, but the entry-level Galaxy Tab S8 and its Plus model only offer a single 12-megapixel camera for selfies and video calling. Battery capacity is reportedly 8,000 mAh and 10,090 mAh for the Galaxy Tab S8 and Tab S8 Plus, respectively.
How much are these smaller tablets going to shave from your bank account? Well, Samsung is said to be asking somewhere between 680 euros (about $775) and 900 euros (roughly $1,030) for the Galaxy Tab S8. For the bigger Galaxy Tab S8+, WinFuture predicts the price tag to fall somewhere between 1,040 euros (approximately $1,190) and 1,220 euros (nearly $1,400). Again, that’s quite a premium, but these are rough estimates, so take them as such.
