Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: Saved by software support

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus was never trying to be the best. The brand already has the best Android tablet – the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra – but that 14-inch behemoth can be quite cumbersome with all its accessories. So, instead of aiming for unrivalled excellence, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus offers a slightly watered-down experience in a more manageable package for a more palatable price.

Against that metric, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus hits far more than it misses. Performance isn’t far behind the Ultra, you still get the S-Pen stylus in the box and all of the Galaxy AI toys are included. Battery life is a bit disappointing and the display has some flaws, but overall, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus works as a more affordable alternative to the biggest, best and most expensive tablets on the market.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: What do you get for the money?

Just like last year’s Galaxy Tab S9 Plus, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus starts at £999 for the 256GB model, with the 512GB version costing £1,099. That’s for the Wi-Fi-only model, but you can also get variants that support 5G connectivity for a further £150, with the 256GB at £1,149 and the 512GB at £1,249.

The build is roughly the same as last year, measuring 285 x 185mm (W x H), but it’s a little thinner at 5.6mm. It’s also a fair bit lighter than the S9 Plus, dropping to 576g for the 5G version and 571g for the Wi-Fi-only model. One thing that hasn’t changed is the limited colour options, with your choices again boiling down to a dark version (Moonstone Grey) or a light version (Platinum Silver).

The frame and rear are once again aluminium, but this has been upgraded to the same “Enhanced Armor” used by the Galaxy S24, S24 Plus and Tab S10 Ultra. Dust and water resistance is as robust as ever, too, with an IP68 rating certifying it dustproof and able to withstand a 30-minute dunk in 1.5m of fresh water.

The display is identical to last year, with the 12.4in AMOLED 2X panel boasting a resolution of 2,800 x 1,754 and a peak refresh rate of 120Hz. As with the Tab S10 Ultra, this display is covered with the same anti-reflection coating as the Galaxy S24 series of phones. Reflections from overhead lighting aren’t completely eradicated by this film but it does make a noticeable impact to the glare and I never found myself bothered by a particularly troublesome reflection.

As we saw with the Ultra, there’s no Snapdragon silicon running the show this time, with the Tab S10 Plus instead powered by the same MediaTek 9300 Plus chipset as its bigger brother. This is paired with 12GB of RAM and either 256GB or 512GB of storage space. It has the same 10,090mAh battery as the Tab S9 Plus, too, along with 45W charging support.

You don’t get a plug in the box but you do at least get the S-Pen stylus, which can snap magnetically to the rear of the tablet for charging and pairing. If you want to use the Tab S10 Plus as a laptop replacement, however, you’ll need to factor in extra for the keyboard case – you can get one without a trackpad for £159 or with a trackpad for £229.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: What did we like about it?

As tends to be the case with any tablet that comes with a bundled stylus, my first port of call was firing up the PenUp app and seeing how responsive and comfortable the S-Pen is for extended drawing sessions. This app has some great tools, including drawing tutorials, a colouring-book mode and Samsung’s Sketch to Image, which uses generative AI to turn your doodles into more polished images in different art styles.

Outside of those tools, there’s a straightforward paint option with a versatile range of brushes. Using the stylus, I found the grip to be comfortable, motion fluid and achieved noticeably different results when applying varying levels of pressure. My only issue is that the single button on the stylus is located a little awkwardly – pressing it switches whatever brush you’re using to an eraser, so I often found myself accidentally erasing bits of my masterpieces because I was holding the pen slightly wrong.

In general use, the tablet is nice and nippy, with the MediaTek Dimensity 9300 Plus delivering a solid bump in CPU speeds over the Tab S9 Plus. As per usual, Apple blows away the competition here, with the iPad Air 13 gaining a 40% lead over the Tab S10 Plus in the multi-core benchmarks. However, as far as the Android competition goes, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus performs very well.

The GPU scores are mostly stagnant in the offscreen benchmarks but there is a slight improvement in the onscreen performance. In use, the Tab S10 Plus ran Asphalt Legends: Unite smoothly enough for my tastes, with no stuttering or lag as I drifted around corners. Once again, you can see the raw power of the 13in iPad Air in the offscreen results but the weedy 60Hz display can’t match Samsung in the onscreen benchmarks.

The Galaxy Tab S10 Plus runs on Android 14 and will receive a massive seven years of software support, just like the rest of Samsung’s 2024 flagship devices. The tablet software is decent, with productivity features like split-screen and a taskbar-esque quick-launch dock at the bottom, as well as quality-of-life inclusions such as the ability to swipe down the notification menu on the left, right or middle of the display, for easier access.

As with all of Samsung’s flagship devices this year, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus also comes loaded with a few Galaxy AI tricks. The voice recorder can now transcribe and summarise recordings, both of which worked fairly well in my testing. There were a few instances of misheard words or incorrect details in the summary so it definitely still needs work but, overall, it’s not a bad effort. Google’s Circle to Search shows up here too, and is much more effective, and the notes app can summarise handwritten scrawls.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: What could be improved?

While there was a lot to like about the display, there were a couple of points that didn’t work for me. For starters, the brightness levels are notably lower than I’d expect for this price, hitting just 299cd/m2 in manual brightness and peaking at 384cd/m2 in adaptive brightness mode with a torch shining on the light sensor. It was slightly better when displaying HDR content, reaching 424cd/m2, and I never found it looked dull when used inside, but this is still a disappointing result for such an expensive tablet.

Colour accuracy leaves a bit to be desired, too. On the Natural profile, which is designed to be the most accurate to the sRGB colour space, I recorded an average Delta E colour variance score of 2.79, which is quite far from the target value of 1 or under. The colours aren’t obviously off when using the tablet, so this niggle is unlikely to affect a lot of people, but when you’re putting down this kind of money, it’s still worth bearing in mind.

Despite using the same sized battery as the Tab S9 Plus, the battery life proved less impressive. It only lasted a little over 11 hours in our looping video test, which is an hour less than the Tab S9 Plus and worse than all of its rivals.

Once depleted, that 45W charging can bring the battery up to 45% in 30 minutes and takes roughly 85 minutes to hit 100%. That’s not terrible but there are faster options out there. I just reviewed the Huawei MatePad Pro (2024), for instance, and its 100W charging managed to fill the battery in just 55 minutes.

The MatePad Pro has issues of its own but is also a few hundred pounds cheaper (starting at £699) and bundles in the keyboard case at no extra charge. With this kind of competition in play, I would like to see Samsung upping its game in the charging stakes.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: Should you buy it?

Based on the handful of incremental upgrades, I was close to saying that you needn’t bother looking at the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus while the S9 Plus is still available. The improvements didn’t impress me much – especially considering that they are paired with a couple of downgrades – but the seven years of software support save the day.

The Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is still our favourite Android tablet overall but, if you aren’t married to the massive 14in display, there’s an argument for saving some cash and picking up the Tab S10 Plus instead. Performance is similar, the Galaxy AI features carry over and you get the same anti-glare display, too. If you can stomach the slightly lacklustre battery life and brightness, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus is an impressive tablet that just about skirts under the four-figure mark.