Samsung Galaxy S25 FE Review: The Most Refined Fan Edition Yet
The Samsung Galaxy S25 FE has arrived, and it quietly brings a host of meaningful upgrades to the Fan Edition lineup. With a lighter body, a slimmer chassis, a bigger battery, and notable improvements to performance and the camera, this phone aims to perfect the “flagship killer” formula. After 100 hours of use, here are our impressions of the most refined FE phone Samsung has ever made.
Design and Build: Slimmer, Lighter, and Still Premium
At first glance, the S25 FE is unmistakably a Samsung phone, featuring the familiar glass and metal sandwich design with three vertically aligned camera rings. Samsung hasn’t cut corners on build quality, offering Corning Gorilla Glass Victus Plus on both the front and back, and the same Armor Aluminum frame found on the flagship S25 and S25+.
Where things get interesting is in the ergonomics. Compared to its predecessor, the S25 FE is significantly more comfortable to hold:
- Thickness: It’s slimmed down to 7.4mm (from 8mm on the S24 FE).
- Weight: It now weighs just 190 grams (down from a hefty 215g on the S24 FE).
Impressively, its dimensions are now nearly identical to the more expensive Galaxy S25+. It also maintains an IP68 rating for water and dust resistance and includes a fast USB Type-C Gen 3.2 port.
Display: A Familiar Panel with a Slimmer Frame
The S25 FE features a 6.7-inch Full HD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X panel with a 120Hz refresh rate and a peak brightness of 2,900 nits. While this is the same panel used in the S24 FE, that’s not a bad thing. It delivers excellent HDR video playback on Netflix and YouTube, remains legible in direct sunlight, and offers the rich, vibrant colors Samsung is known for.
The key improvement is that the bezels are 26% slimmer than last year’s model. While not entirely symmetrical (the chin is slightly larger), the reduced borders create a more immersive viewing experience. The optical in-display fingerprint scanner works flawlessly, and the stereo speakers, tuned by Dolby Atmos, are loud, rich, and clean.
Performance and Thermals: A Major Leap Forward
Powered by the Exynos 2500 chipset—a slightly higher-clocked version of the previous generation—the S25 FE delivers a noticeable performance bump. It comes in three variants: 8/128GB (UFS 3.1), 8/256GB (UFS 4.0), and 8/512GB (UFS 4.0).
The real story is the gaming and thermal performance. In a 30-minute Genshin Impact test at the highest settings, the phone maintained a rock-solid 57.9 FPS average, a huge jump over the S24 FE. Even more impressively, the phone remained cool, peaking at just 43°C. This is thanks to a new liquid thermal interface material and a 13% larger vapor cooling chamber, an incredible engineering feat considering the slimmer chassis.
Battery and Charging: Bigger and Faster
Despite being thinner and lighter, the S25 FE packs a larger 4,900 mAh battery (a 200 mAh increase). For the first time in the FE series, it supports 15W Qi2 wireless charging. Wired charging has also been significantly upgraded from 25W to a much faster 45W. Samsung claims up to 28 hours of continuous video playback.
Cameras: A Refined Experience with a Selfie Upgrade
The rear camera setup is identical to the S24 FE: a 50MP main camera, a 12MP ultrawide, and an 8MP 3x telephoto lens. However, the image processing has improved, with better low-light performance and well-tuned HDR thanks to Samsung’s Pro Visual Engine. The Object Aware Engine delivers better portrait shots with natural-looking background blur.
The biggest hardware upgrade is the selfie camera, which has been bumped from 10MP to 12MP. Selfies look fantastic, with great detail and punchier skin tones. The front camera now also supports Nightography, reducing noise in low-light selfies.
On the video front, the S25 FE can record 4K 60fps from both its primary and selfie cameras, and it’s the first FE phone to support 4K HDR video recording. The “Instant Slow Motion” AI feature also makes a welcome return.
Software: The Full Flagship AI Experience
The S25 FE launches with One UI 8 based on Android 16 right out of the box, even ahead of the standard S25 series. Samsung promises an industry-leading 7 years of both OS and security updates.
Crucially, it includes the full suite of Galaxy AI features: Generative Edit, Sketch to Image, Live Translate, Note Assist, and Google’s Gemini. It also comes with a 6-month free subscription to Google AI Pro and 2TB of free storage.
Conclusion: The Smartest “Fan Edition” Yet
The Samsung Galaxy S25 FE is the most refined version of an FE phone to date. It doesn’t try to be flashy; instead, it delivers meaningful upgrades where they count. It’s thinner and lighter, yet it packs a larger battery, faster charging, and a much-improved thermal system. With a great selfie camera and the full flagship AI software experience, the S25 FE is a thoughtfully engineered device that offers incredible value.
Key Specifications
- Display: 6.7-inch Full HD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X, 120Hz, 2,900 nits peak brightness
- Processor: Exynos 2500
- RAM: 8GB
- Storage: 128GB (UFS 3.1), 256GB / 512GB (UFS 4.0)
- Dimensions: 7.4mm thickness, 190g weight
- Rear Cameras: 50MP Main + 12MP Ultrawide + 8MP 3x Telephoto
- Front Camera: 12MP
- Battery: 4,900 mAh
- Charging: 45W Wired, 15W Qi2 Wireless
- Build: Armor Aluminum frame, Gorilla Glass Victus Plus (front & back)
- Durability: IP68 Water & Dust Resistance
- Software: One UI 8 based on Android 16 (7 years of updates)
