Galaxy S21: overheating, disastrous battery life, terrible cameras - another Not

[Raph06]

I got my S21 Ultra (Exynos) on Thursday 28 Jan. Today is Sunday 31 Jan. 
I noticed, from day 1, that the phone was getting hot quite quickly, although I was only transferring data, setting things up, etc.

Then I noticed the battery life was not great, but I know that the phone learns about my usagé pattern and adapts to it, so I waited. Today, the phone has allegedly finished learning and predicted a battery life of 18 hours. Not great.

As I was using the phone for basic tasks, I noticed the battery was declining rapidly.

Then I started using the camera, I noticed thé overheating. I only took a few shots and a few short videos, and the phone became too hot to hold comfortably. I put it in my pocket, and I could feel the heat through the fabric!!!🤔

Now, the 18 hours predicted battery’s life has turned to 13 hours, and going down fast.

Tha Camera app was active for 34 minutes, with 1 h 10 mins in the background, for a battery usage of 13%.

On top of that, the quality of the photos is appalling. Highlights are blown, low contrast, etc. But that will be the subject of another post, if I’m still the owner of this inferior piece of hardware.

I’m thinking of going back to my Galaxy S10+.

Update 1: I installed CPU monitor. I picked up the phone from idle to shoot some video. The CPU temperature went from 29C to 41C in 2 minutes. 

I put the phone to charge. The CPU temperature is 41C, with high CPU usage, when I was actually doing nothing.

[adamlee]

delete chrome. it's causing issues... battery drain. also smart things is another battery draining app

[adamlee]

I'm pretty sure they'll roll one out soon.

[GeorgeNikolov]

I am so so happy that I am not the only person.. I got mine on the 28th of Jan as well. My S10+ is sitting next to me with the S21ultra and has gone from 100% at 9am this morning down to 84% still having all my apps active etc. messenger, insta, etc etc. My S21 Ultra is now on charge since 7pm from 3% . The battery life is absolutely terrible! I am considering sending it back if it is not fixed soon! I am also sending an e-mail to Samsung as I want to make sure this has been translated over to them early enough so they dont say its my fault. I am so so disappointed !

[kenseyanne]

exact same issue and I've only had it two days!

[jaro76]

im a reddit user and some of the other users seem to report issues if you use smart switch to shift everything over. i redownloaded all my stuff via google and didnt use smart switch and phones been golden so far. use samsung internet..remove chrome. it has some issues. probably with the new x1 chip.

[Raph06]

Interesting. I did indeed use Smart Switch. I'll wait one or two more days and envisage reinstalling.
I just took 4 photos. The phone became noticeably hotter in the space of 1 minute. Very bizarre.

It would be interesting to hear from others with the same problem as me whether they used Smart Switch.

I never use Chrome.

[Blessed4life]

Hi all.
https://youtu.be/kwF4l77KJ1Y

[Albabarn]

cheers, a couple of settings changed. bloody sham though that we have to do this. I've a 2yr old P30 Pro that didn't need any changes and its battery beasts the S21...

[Jason10]

Have you reported this to Samsung? I'm interested to know where we can report bugs too so it comes to their attention to develop fixes.

[footballstriker]

I've noticed something very strange and wondered if this was just a fault that's come with that specific phone or something that every S21 ultra device is going to suffer with. The sound quality is really bad, like muffled. I noticed it more than anything when I heard my chosen notification sound go off (Crescent) and I thought that doesn't sound right. I got both phones side by side to compare and that notification sound is actually much clearer and better on the s20+ than on the s21 ultra. I then played other things like music and even had a phone call on the s21 ultra and realised that everything sounds kinda muffled on it. It's almost as if they've made the sound chip inside really cheap. There is nothing blocking the speakers and as it's brand new, there is no damp or dirt stuck inside, I even tried gently blowing inside the speaker to see. Samsung said they weren't aware of any people phoning about that particular issue on release day. They've put it down to a faulty phone and they're obviously going to replace it but I wondered if anyone else has had the same issue? I'd of thought if anything the sound should be even better on the s21 ultra, not worse!! Can't say I've really been able to notice the bass much because I was so shocked by how bad the treble sounded. This is all with the headphones NOT being plugged in.