Samsung has announced the Galaxy Tab S12 Ultra and Galaxy Tab S12+, and both include an S Pen in the box. Availability starts October 7 in select markets, in Gray and Silver. If you take handwritten notes on Android, here is what matters.
What Samsung says about the pen
According to Samsung’s announcement, both models come with an ergonomic S Pen for note-taking, annotating and sketching. The spec table lists it as “S Pen (BLE not supported)”, so this is the simple in-box pen, not one with Bluetooth remote features. The announcement also says the tablet and the included S Pen are rated IP68 for water and dust resistance, under lab conditions Samsung describes in its footnotes.
The two tablets
- Galaxy Tab S12 Ultra: 14.6-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X display at 2960 x 1848 and 120Hz, 5.1mm thin, 692 g (Wi-Fi), 11,600 mAh battery.
- Galaxy Tab S12+: 12.6-inch display at 2800 x 1752 and 120Hz, 553 g (Wi-Fi), 10,600 mAh battery.
- Both: MediaTek Dimensity 9500, 45W charging, Bluetooth 6.0, up to 1,600 nits peak brightness. The Ultra has Wi-Fi 7 and the S12+ has Wi-Fi 6E.
Samsung quotes battery life of up to 23 hours on the Ultra and 21 hours on the S12+. Those are video playback figures from Samsung’s own lab conditions, so treat them as a ceiling, not a promise for hours of inking.
Apps bundled for handwriting and drawing
For note-takers, the software list is as relevant as the hardware. Samsung says Notability comes pre-loaded with a six-month free trial and 20% off the first subscription. Adobe Photoshop 16 is pre-loaded too, with S Pen support and four months of free access to the Photoshop mobile plan. Samsung also lists offers for Goodnotes, Clip Studio Paint, Noteshelf 3 and MyScript Notes. Trial lengths and availability vary by country, and most of these become paid after the trial.
In Samsung Notes, Samsung describes Note Assist summarizing your notes. It requires a Samsung Account and feature availability varies by region and language.
What we don’t know yet
Pricing was not in the announcement text we read, and we have not tested these tablets. Pen feel, latency and palm rejection are things only a hands-on review can answer, so wait for those before pre-ordering for drawing.
If you are still choosing a note-taking app for any tablet, see our apps section.
