Brutal teardown reveals how much titanium is actually inside the Galaxy S24 Ultra

Samsung has garnered a lot of hype around the utilization of titanium in the Galaxy S24 Ultra. A teardown of the device reveals just how much is inside the phone, and whether it deserves that much hype or not.

The Galaxy S24 Ultra brings very little to the overall design of the Galaxy Ultra series. This year, Samsung has added a couple of small physical changes, like the introduction of a titanium frame. It’s advertised as a strengthening measure, as titanium is much stronger than steel or aluminum and comes in at a fraction of the weight.

Titanium is also much more expensive, and the Galaxy S24 Ultra suffers from a $100 increase over last year’s Ultra. Of course, there are a lot of AI features added to the phone that sports an AI-focused Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. Our review of the Galaxy S24 Ultra breaks that cost increase down, but a new video showing the actual titanium framing of the S24 Ultra has cropped up, putting a lot of the detailed questions to rest.

Posted by JerryRigEverything on YouTube, Zach can be seen breaking the Galaxy S24 Ultra down, as he does with most flagships. This one, in particular, goes a step further.

The first clue as to how much of this famed material Samsung is using is on the first step of the teardown. The back of the phone is glass, not titanium. That comes off with a little heat, as most of Samsung’s modern rear panels do. Underneath it sits a few key components, like a copper wireless charging coil and a large camera module. The 200MP main shooter, 12MP ultrawide, and 50MP+10MP telephoto duo can be seen in the module.

Taking some of these modules out gives a quick glance at how Samsung went about manufacturing the S24 Ultra with titanium. Rather than taking raw stock of titanium and milling it out, as has been the case with aluminum frames, the S24 Ultra carries a plastic buffer on the inside of the titanium rails. Underneath the battery and larger vapor chamber, aluminum can be seen rather readily.

How much titanium is Samsung using?

The video goes on to end in a blaze of almost glory. It turns out Samsung is using very little middle-grade titanium to form the rails and edges of the device. Inside those rails sits plastic, molded to join an aluminum inner frame to the titanium sides.

With the phone frame dumped into a furnace running at around 2000 degrees Fahrenheit, the individual pieces of titanium can clearly be seen. The aluminum is, of course, melted into a small coin of molten metal. The plastic is completely gone.

If you were to look at the Galaxy S24 Ultra, all you would see is titanium and glass. But that use-case is only surface-deep. Inside sits a plastic buffer and aluminum frame to make up the majority of the device. Of course, the Galaxy S24 Ultra would be much more expensive if it were to be made of titanium on the inside, as well.