I was wrong — the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s battery life is fantastic

I was disappointed when I saw the spec sheet for the Galaxy S26 Ultra. The boost in charging speeds was welcome, but seeing Samsung stick with the same 5,000mAh battery made it natural to assume the experience would be no better than that of previous models.

After a few months of use, it’s time to admit I was wrong. The Galaxy S26 Ultra has some of the best battery life I’ve ever seen, and it’s hard to give it up for other phones.

I wasn’t planning on spending much time with the Galaxy S26 Ultra outside of testing One UI 9. I wish the display were brighter; I’ve grown tired of Samsung’s reused cameras, and I’ve been more than happy with my Pixel 10 Pro. That changed when the dreaded battery drain hit my Pixel, and I decided to switch to the S26 Ultra until Google finally fixes things. Or should I say, if Google fixes things?

Even though my S26 Ultra is running the One UI 9 beta, it’s getting me through even the heaviest of days without worrying. In the screenshot below, I didn’t even bother charging the phone when I went to bed.

After a full day of use, I left the phone unplugged overnight and still had almost 50% remaining after 5 hours and 37 minutes of screen time. I kept using it that second day until 7 PM. I’ve never done that with any other phone before.

That was two days spent working from home on Wi-Fi, but the S26 Ultra continues to impress on heavier days. The phone has endured hours-long road trips with wireless Android Auto, music streaming over data, and GPS for navigation, and I still had more than 35% when I went to bed.

Numbers like this aren’t the be-all and end-all. My usage is different from all of yours. Even so, the Galaxy S26 Ultra has beaten almost every other Android phone I’ve ever used.

The charging is good, too. 60W might not be as fast as other competitors, but it beats anything Google has and what Samsung has offered in the past — and the S26 Ultra is rapid. The phone is also conservative with its charging estimates. In the screenshot above, it’s estimating 29 minutes to reach 100% from 56%, but I’d be surprised if it ever took that long. Last week, I plugged the phone in at 30%, and it reached 68% in less than 20 minutes.

I wrote the S26 Ultra off as another lazy upgrade, and I’m sure plenty of other people did the same. I was wrong, and until I started using the Razr Fold this week, the S26 Ultra gave me the best battery life I’d ever seen. Even when my Pixel doesn’t have a battery drain issue, it’ll be hard to go back to a phone that doesn’t last this long.