I own the Samsung Galaxy S25 and love it—the battery lasts for ages, it’s very customizable, and it’s super snappy. But it’s not a perfect phone. It got me thinking about my old Galaxy S8, and how a phone released in 2017 actually did some things better than the S25.
5
Charger in the Box
According to Samsung, the company doesn’t provide a charger plug with the S25 because it wants to minimize the impact its products have on the environment. That’s a reasonable explanation, and you likely already have a charger from a previous phone.
However, you might not have the optimal charger for your S25. The base S25 is best with a 25W charger, while the Plus and Ultra are capable of quicker charging speeds with 45W. Plus, you may just want an extra charger for traveling or if you’re prone to misplacing them.
Samsung 45W Power Adapter with Cable
$29.99 $49.99 Save
$20
The 45W power adapter from Samsung comes with a USB-C cable and is compatible with the S25 phones.
You still get a USB-C cable with the S25, but the S8 came with a cable and a wall charger. The S8 had everything you needed in the box; there was no need to hand Samsung more money.
4
LED Notifications
The top-left of the S8 houses an LED indicator used for various purposes. It blinks blue for app notifications or red if the battery is low, for example. Importantly, the light functions when the screen is off, and stays on until you clear the notification. This meant I could quickly see whether something on my S8 required attention, even if I was on the other side of the room.
The S25’s Always On Display partly replaces this, but new notifications aren’t as easy to see at a glance as a bright, blinking LED. Thankfully, the third-party app aodNotify recreates a traditional notification light with lots of customization—it’d be nice to see Samsung adopt this in its official Good Lock app.
3
Headphone Jack
It might seem like a distant memory now considering how many phone manufacturers have since dropped it on flagships (including the S25), but the S8 has a 3.5mm headphone jack. That’s right—while you can easily use a pair of wireless Bluetooth earbuds, you can equally pop in any 3.5mm headphones and not worry about whether they are charged.
Granted, you can still use wired headphones without a headphone jack on the S25, whether you buy an adapter or USB-C headphones, but some people still lament losing the flexibility of the dedicated 3.5mm port.
Personally, while I do miss the 3.5mm port, I’ve come to love my wireless Samsung Galaxy Buds.
Samsung Galaxy Buds 3
The Galaxy Buds 3 are Samsung’s everyday earbuds, offering high-end features without the premium price tag of the Buds 3 Pro. They include 11mm dynamic drivers, active noise cancellation, and impressive battery life.
2
Expandable Storage
The microSD card tray of the Samsung Galaxy S8.
The base S8 has 64GB of internal storage, while the Plus also has a 128GB variant. That’s a reasonable amount by today’s standards, but the great thing is you can expand the storage with a memory card of up to 256GB in size.
Comparatively, the S25 has 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, or 1TB of storage, depending on the model, with no support for expandable storage. I won’t blindly argue in favor of microSD cards—it was on my S8 that one corrupted and lost my data—but the S8 having expandable physical storage meant I didn’t have to turn to cloud subscriptions when I ran out of internal space.
This is like the headphone jack, though. The S25 isn’t unique in not supporting microSD cards; they haven’t been included in most phones for years.
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1
Curved Screen
Undoubtedly, my favorite feature about the S8 is the curved screen (or “infinity display”, as Samsung dubbed it) that wrapped around the edges of the phone. With relatively small bezels at the top and bottom, and a display that is rich and bright, the S8 still looks amazing today.
The curved edges not only improve the visuals, but I found they made the S8 comfortable to hold and a breeze to access Edge Panels (which still exist on the S25).
The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, with the Edge Panel expanded.
I’m not unhappy with the S25’s display or feel by any means, but it certainly looks more like every other phone. I used to get many inquiries about my S8 because it looked so cool.
I’m not suggesting that you use a S8 over the S25. For starters, the former doesn’t receive security updates anymore and some apps simply won’t work on it. But it’s interesting to look back at a phone from long ago and see what we lost along the way.
Samsung Galaxy S25
$800 $900 Save
$100
The Samsung Galaxy S25 is a powerful and compact smartphone with a 6.2-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X display and a 120Hz refresh rate. It is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, 12GB of RAM, and a 4,000mAh battery with 25W Super Fast Charging.
