Samsung’s latest flagship, the Galaxy S22 Ultra, launched globally and is set to compete for market share with Apple’s iPhone 13 Pro Max. Does it pack enough muscle to beat Apple’s optimization with the A15 Bionic processor in the iPhone 13 Pro Max?
In some markets, Samsung offers the Galaxy S22 Ultra with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor instead of its own latest and greatest Exynos 2200 chip. Meanwhile, Apple powers the iPhone 13 range with its powerful and incredibly well-optimized A15 Bionic chip.
Read: Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra vs. iPhone 13 Pro Max Comparison: Which One to Buy?
The iPhone 13 Pro Max uses the same 6GB of RAM that its predecessor offered, while the Galaxy S22 Ultra has 12GB of RAM instead of 16GB like its predecessor in the top-of-the-line variant. So, YouTuber XEETECHCARE compared the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1-powered Galaxy S22 Ultra with 8GB of RAM against the iPhone 13 Pro Max with 6GB of RAM to create a seemingly level playing field for a speed test.
The speed test evaluated the devices for their smoothness and speed, opening native and third-party apps, running games, browsers, and keeping apps in memory for multitasking. The iPhone 13 Pro Max was faster to boot up and consistently faster in loading most apps. Loading time for games like Asphalt 9 and PUBG was a bit of a mixed bag with the Galaxy S22 Ultra loading the app faster the first time but the iPhone 13 Pro Max demonstrating noticeably shorter in-app load times.
Despite being hamstrung by lesser RAM on paper, the iPhone 13 Pro Max kept all but the heaviest of apps and games in its memory — an area where older iPhones have usually struggled. The ability to keep apps in memory and load more game resources onto it at once is a testament to Apple’s superior optimization of the A15 Bionic and its memory management.
Evaluating the speed in demanding tasks such as video rendering and gaming, the iPhone 13 Pro Max shined yet again, rendering a 4K video to 1080p noticeably faster than its Korean counterpart. Both the phones had comparably smooth user interfaces at the 120Hz refresh rate that they offer. However, the iPhone 13 Pro Max emerged as the better phone for multitasking because most apps did not have to reload when accessed from the App Picker menu. Samsung’s RAM utilization and optimization have progressed with the Galaxy S22 Ultra but it barely keeps up with the iPhone 13 Pro Max.
Our Take
iPhones have always managed to beat flagship Samsung phones in terms of app launching speed tests, but since the iPhone 12 Pro Max, they don’t lag behind them in RAM management either. The Galaxy S22 Ultra equipped with 12GB of RAM could blow the iPhone 13 Pro Max out of the water, but it’s the iPhone’s combination of optimization and efficient use of resources with the A15 Bionic and 6GB RAM that takes the cake.
