The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is your Reader’s Choice for best phone of 2024

We’ve tallied all the votes and have come to a unanimous conclusion: Android Authority readers have selected the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra as the best phone of 2024 and the winner of this year’s Reader’s Choice award! Out of all the amazing smartphones you can get, our readers say this one is the one you should invest in.

Now that you know the Reader’s Choice award winner, you might be curious how that came to be. We’ve got all the data for you below!

Our first round of voting happened here at Android Authority. This year, we started with a very long list of 35 phones, even more than we saw in 2023. Before voting even began, we correctly assumed the Google Pixel 9 Pro and the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra would shoot to the top, but there were a few surprises we didn’t expect.

For example, every year for the past four years, we’ve seen an iPhone make it to the final four round. However, that wasn’t the case this year. Of the two iPhones on the list, the iPhone 16 Pro Max got the closest to the final four, but it narrowly missed out, landing in fifth place underneath the OnePlus 12. Speaking of which, that phone making it into the final four was also a surprise. Last year, we only saw phones from the three titans of tech in the United States: Samsung, Google, and Apple. For OnePlus to nudge its way into the final four — sending the iPhones home early — was a welcome surprise.

Looking at the data, there were a few other notable surprises. First, every phone on the list got at least one vote. That doesn’t happen too often; there are almost always a few phones with zero votes. Additionally, it was interesting to see the OPPO Find X8 Pro come through with more votes than expected. It gained more traction than the iPhone 16, Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus, and both foldable phones in the 2024 Galaxy Z lineup. Nice job, OPPO!

Outside of a few anomalies, though, it was mostly business as usual. The phones from Samsung, Google, and Apple all had solid numbers, and most of the phones that don’t have a presence in the US didn’t fare as well. That makes sense when you know that Android Authority is focused on the US consumer market.

With the elimination round out of the way, let’s move on to the final four!

At the end of the elimination round, we had four phones left: the Google Pixel 9 Pro, the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, the Google Pixel 9 Pro XL, and the OnePlus 12. With these four selected, we expanded our voting pool to our social media platforms, namely Threads, X, Facebook, and YouTube (note: we’re on Bluesky, too, but polling is a bit trickier on there — give us a follow anyway!). This gave everyone up to five chances to vote, including the vote at Android Authority itself.

With a broader voting pool, we saw a significant shift in outcomes. Where the Google Pixel 9 Pro was the clear front-runner during the elimination round, the Galaxy S24 Ultra overtook it handily during the final four round. Unfortunately, the OnePlus 12 died on the vine here, trailing way behind on all platforms.

The chart below shows you a summary of the vote percentage across all five voting platforms:

As you can see, the Galaxy S24 Ultra obliterated the competition. However, it is interesting to note that the Google Pixel 9 Pro and the Pixel 9 Pro XL are essentially the same phone. This split the vote a bit. If voters had rallied behind one of them in the elimination round, then that phone likely would have fared much better here. In fact, if you combine the votes for the two Pixels, you get about 49% of the vote, which would have easily beat the Galaxy S24 Ultra.

Unfortunately, this is just how the numbers turned out. Android Authority doesn’t do anything with the Reader’s Choice Award besides giving you a platform to make your voice heard. We figured the Pixel 9 Pro and Pixel 9 Pro XL both making it into the final four would hurt Google’s chances, but there was nothing we could do about it.

In the end, the two winners here were the Galaxy S24 Ultra and, by a hair, the Pixel 9 Pro. That brings us to the final round!

The votes poured in during the final round — thousands across Android Authority and five social media platforms. Within just a few hours, it was pretty clear how things were going to go: the Galaxy S24 Ultra was going to win.

However, what’s interesting is how the votes break down across the six platforms. Here at Android Authority, for example, the Galaxy S24 Ultra actually lost by a pretty sizable 8% margin. Over on Threads, the audience was totally split, with an even 50/50 outcome for both phones.

On the other four platforms, though, the Pixel 9 Pro didn’t stand a chance. The Galaxy S24 Ultra beat the Pixel 9 Pro by double-digit margins on all but one platform (it only won by a 9% margin on Facebook). The Pixel 9 Pro’s win on our website just couldn’t compete with that.

Ultimately, this outcome isn’t super surprising. Our readers have loved Samsung’s Galaxy S Ultra phones since even before they were Ultra phones. Prior to the first Galaxy S Ultra device, the latest Galaxy Note phone would almost always win the Reader’s Choice Award of that year. In fact, in 2022, when the Google Pixel 7 Pro won both the Reader’s Choice Award and the Editor’s Choice Award, that was a truly unexpected outcome. This year, though, it’s business as usual.

Either way, the Galaxy S24 Ultra and Pixel 9 Pro are terrific devices. You honestly can’t go wrong with either one. The Pixel 9 Pro ($999 at Amazon) is perfect for people who want something a little more compact but with plenty of power and features, and the Galaxy S24 Ultra ($1419.99 at Amazon) is for the folks who want their phone to do… literally everything, no matter how big and costly it might be.

We’re excited to see what happens next year. Will our readers continue to prefer Samsung, or will the tides change? Until then, congratulations to Samsung for your well-deserved win!

Now, it’s time for you to let us know how you feel about the Galaxy S24 Ultra’s win! Was it well-deserved, or did the Pixel 9 Pro get snubbed? Was there another phone that should have made it further into the event before getting voted out? Sound off in the comments with your thoughts!