Samsung finally launched its Galaxy Note 8 smartphone in India. The Galaxy Note 8 is a first device of the company to sport a dual rear camera setup. The new Galaxy Note 8 comes with the Bixby virtual assistant in tow; Bixby will understand Indian accents, dialects, and context when it launches later this month for Samsung Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8+, and the Galaxy Note 8. Coming back to the Galaxy Note 8 though, it sports a huge 6.3-inch Infinity Display with 18.5:9 aspect ratio and S Pen support; incidentally, this is the largest screen ever on a Samsung Galaxy Note handset.
Here’s all that you need to know about Samsung’s new big-screen phone
Samsung Galaxy Note 8 price in India, launch offers, availability
Launch offers
The company has also announced some interesting launch offers with the Galaxy Note 8. The customers who pre-book the device will get wireless charger free and one-time screen replacement guarantee. There’s also an Rs 4,000 cash back offer for HDFC credit card holders. The company has also introduced an exchange programme Samsung Galaxy Note in association with Cashify app. Under this programme, users of the older-generation Galaxy Note smartphones will get a discount on the purchase of Galaxy Note 8.
The company is also offering data worth 448GB on Reliance Jio network on the purchase of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8.
Price and availability
Samsung Galaxy Note 8 price in India is Rs. 67,900, and the smartphone has been launched in its 64GB inbuilt storage variant. It will be available in its Maple Gold and Midnight Black colour variants. The smartphone is now available for pre-bookings in India, and will start shipping to users from September 21 – which is when it also becomes available. Early buyers will also get a free wireless charger bundled with the smartphone, as well as a one-time screen replacement.
Samsung Galaxy Note 8 specifications
The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 comes with the company’s home-brewed Bixby digital assistant, rival to Apple Siri and Microsoft Cortana. The company claims that Bixby can do much more than its rivals, including being able to handle any smartphone-related task that is managed by touch. The voice assistant will initially be integrated with Samsung’s native applications including Camera, Contacts, Gallery, Messages and Settings. The company has incorporated a dedicated button for the virtual assistant and users can also say ‘Hey Bixby’ to launch the app. The Bixby capability will roll out in India starting September 30 for both Note 8 and the Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+.
The dual-SIM (Nano-SIM) Samsung Galaxy Note 8 runs Android 7.1.1 Nougat with the company’s own customizations on top. The smartphone features a 6.3-inch QHD+ (1440×2960 pixels) Super AMOLED Infinity Display with a pixel density of 521ppi and a screen aspect ratio of 18.5:9. Notably, the default resolution of the smartphone is FHD+, and can be changed to QHD+ via settings. The Galaxy Note 8 is powered by a Samsung Exynos 8895 SoC (four cores clocked at 2.3GHz and four cores clocked at 1.7GHz) coupled with 6GB of LPDDR4 RAM.
The smartphone is powered by a 3300mAh battery, and the company has been keen to show off the numerous safety checks it has undergone – after the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 recall controversy from last year. The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 has wireless charging, supporting the WPC and PMAFast Charging standards compatible with Quick Charge 2.0. It measures 162.5×74.8×8.6mm and weighs 195 grams.
The device comes equipped with a fingerprint sensor, facial recognition and iris scanner along with this it also offers support for Samsung Pay, which was launched by the company earlier this year.
The phablet is backed by a 3,300 mAh battery and supports wireless fast charging. In terms of connectivity, the device offers 4G, VoLTE, 3G, Bluetooth v5.0, USB Type-C, NFC, GPS and Wi-Fi.
Coming to the stylus, the Samsung this time has introduced an ‘enhanced’ S Pen, which will enable the users to take notes in Screen off memo or quickly annotate documents and photos. This time the S Pen comes with a finer tip and is also more pressure sensitive. The company has also introduced Live Messages that lets you handwrite a message, add special effects.
