Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 and Tab S11 Ultra: good enough for 2025?

With the Galaxy Tab S11 and the Tab S11 Ultra, Samsung has presented two tablet heavyweights. I’m glad that after the Tab S10 there’s a more manageable 11-inch variant again with the Tab S11. The question is: is there enough new in the series to outweigh the criticisms?

Thinner, lighter and with a bigger battery

Both tablets have become thinner and lighter compared with their predecessors. The Tab S11 Ultra lost 26 g and 0.3 mm and still gets a bigger battery at 11,600 mAh. The Tab S11 is almost 30 g and 0.4 mm slimmer than the Tab S9. The tech industry is in a slimming craze, but I welcome it, because after 20 years I’m done with thick tech bricks.

Display and processor

	Tab S11	Tab S11 Ultra
Display	11-inch Dynamic AMOLED	14.6-inch Dynamic AMOLED
Brightness	up to 1,600 nits	up to 1,600 nits
Processor	MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ (3 nm)	MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ (3 nm)
RAM	12 GB	12 GB, 16 GB with 1 TB storage
Recommended retail price (RRP)	€899	€1,339

The Tab S11 Ultra is so big that it calls out to be a laptop replacement. Just for watching Netflix, it would be like buying a Porsche to drive to the mailbox. For the new chip, Samsung states a 24% faster CPU, a 27% faster GPU and a 33% faster NPU. Even with the Tab S10, I had nothing to complain about regarding performance. The faster chip is needed because of AI: both devices run One UI 8 on Android 16. If you want the latest AI on a tablet, you’re in the right place with Samsung. Other Android tablets offer Google Gemini at most, and Apple has kind of missed the train with Apple Intelligence.

With the Tab S11 Ultra I can edit 4K videos without stutters, for me the ultimate performance test. Both models come with Wi-Fi or 5G, and they can be expanded to up to 2 TB with a microSD card.

Extended DeX Mode and desktop mode

Extended DeX Mode is new. Until now, in DeX mode you could only mirror to a monitor. Now an external monitor, wireless or wired, serves as a second screen, and apps can be moved between the tablet and the monitor by drag and drop. I can watch YouTube on the monitor while I’m stuck in a boring video conference. Or I leave the calendar open on the Tab S11 and answer emails with appointment requests on the monitor. That’s every bit as good as a laptop with a second screen.

The desktop mode also exists without a monitor: apps open as windows and can be arranged freely. You can save the combination as your own desktop, as you know it from the smartphones. Extended DeX Mode will probably come to the predecessors via an update, too.

S Pen, sound and unlocking

• S Pen: It’s included free and now resembles a pencil. That makes it easier to grip. As on the Galaxy S25 Ultra, it has lost gestures and Bluetooth features. That doesn’t bother me, I never used them.
• Speakers: The quad speakers surprised me on both devices. The sound is rich and loud, even fuller on the Tab S11 Ultra.
• Unlocking: By PIN, face recognition or an optical in-display fingerprint scanner. That’s rather unusual for Android tablets.

My criticism of the display

My only criticism concerns the display, for different reasons on the two models. On the Tab S11 Ultra, the anti-reflective coating is only supposedly there. It does reflect a bit less light, but for €1,339 RRP I had hoped for a matte display. Precisely because the hardware novelties are manageable, that would have been a real reason to buy. The Tab S11 doesn’t have the anti-reflective coating at all.

On the Tab S11 at €899 RRP, the thick display borders bother me. The Ultra shows that Samsung can do thin borders. Some like the resting area for the thumbs, but for my money I’d rather have more high-quality display area.

Updates and upgrade

Both tablets get seven years of updates for the operating system and security. Whether you can and want to still use a tablet well in seven years, given the racing development of AI, is another matter.

Verdict

Bigger battery, slimmer, lighter, brighter, more power and a better DeX mode: that’s the summary of the Tab S11 series. In AI and productivity, it’s way ahead when you look at the competition. On the display, Samsung could have done a bit more, in my view.

An upgrade from the Tab S10 Ultra is probably not necessarily worth it. From the Tab S9 to the Tab S11, it can be worth it because of the brighter display and above all the processor, if you want to play graphically demanding games or use the many Galaxy and Google AI features smoothly.