iPhone 16 Pro Max Beaten by Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra in App Loading Speed Test

Apple's iPhone 16 Pro Max has been comprehensively beaten by the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra in a real world app speed test conducted by PhoneBuff, with the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip and 12GB of RAM winning out over the A18 Pro chip and 8GB of RAM in Apple's smartphone.


The performance test measured how long it took each phone to open and process tasks across a series of apps. Each smartphone cycled through identical apps, including Facebook, Starbucks, Microsoft Office apps, Snapseed, and various games.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra established an early lead through productivity apps and maintained its advantage in image editing tasks, with Snapseed exports completing significantly faster than on the iPhone. Most notably, the Galaxy processed video in LumaFusion approximately 25% faster than the iPhone 16 Pro Max – an area where Apple's smartphones have traditionally excelled.

Even in gaming performance, which historically has been an iPhone strength, Samsung's flagship maintained its edge. The S25 Ultra matched or outperformed the iPhone in most games tested, including Subway Surfers and Flip Diving, but the iPhone did manage slim victories in Going Balls and Forward Assault.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra completed the first lap of app launches in 2 minutes and 18 seconds, a full 15 seconds ahead of the iPhone 16 Pro Max. In the second lap, which tests how well the phones maintain apps in memory, the iPhone managed to reduce the gap slightly, but the Galaxy still secured what PhoneBuff called Samsung's "biggest speed test win in years."

Samsung's impressive performance is likely a consequence of its overclocked Snapdragon 8 Elite chip and a 40% larger cooling system, combined with Android 15 and One UI 7 running with an extra 4GB of RAM available. Both devices demonstrate exceptional real-world performance, but the test results suggest Samsung has taken a significant lead in raw processing capability, despite the extra time Apple has had to optimize iOS 18 for its hardware.

Apple typically upgrades iPhones with faster and more efficient chip technology each year, so it will be interesting to see how the iPhone 17 performs when the new series debuts in September. Apple's A19 chip technology is likely to be built on an upgraded 3-nanometer process, which TSMC calls N3P, and the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are expected to include an A19 Pro chip.

Compared to earlier versions of 3nm chips, the N3P chips offer increased performance efficiency and increased transistor density. All iPhone 17 models will also reportedly include a vapor chamber heatsink to improve thermal performance.

Tag: Samsung

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Top Rated Comments

System603 Avatar
21 weeks ago

Who uses android?
According to some stats:

* 3.3 to 3.9 billion users globally, roughly 70% market share [1]
* 42–44% of the U.S. market [2]

Those aren’t rookie numbers—that’s the majority of the world. Of course, probably only a very, very tiny fraction of them use the S25 [3].

Edit: Some fellow forum members seem to disagree with the stats, but alas, there's nothing I can do about the numbers. Don't shoot the messenger. ??‍♂️

Sources: [1] ('https://www.statista.com/statistics/272698/global-market-share-held-by-mobile-operating-systems-since-2009/') [2] ('https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/united-states-of-america')
[3] no source here, just my estimate based on S25 being both new and flagship-priced
Score: 38 Votes (Like | Disagree)
vertsix Avatar
21 weeks ago
Good. Hope this causes Apple to improve and optimize iOS. It's been largely neglected in the stability and performance front after iOS 12.
Score: 29 Votes (Like | Disagree)
m4mario Avatar
21 weeks ago
Oh No, now all iOS users are going to totally switch to Samsung to get that 0.5 millisecond speed boost.
Score: 28 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Quasselstripper Avatar
21 weeks ago

Lol. That battery percentage of the Samsung. That’s almost 30% more battery consumption…
I’d rather have extra battery life than marginally faster phone.
It started at 71% and went down to 70%. iPhone from 81 to 80. Would say pretty even.
Score: 27 Votes (Like | Disagree)
enkiera Avatar
21 weeks ago

How is this important? Who uses android?
Android has a 70% worldwide market share so...most people?
Score: 27 Votes (Like | Disagree)
mxrider88 Avatar
21 weeks ago
Probably due to rubbish software on iPhone.

But funny to read the comments here above.
For almost 2 decades we had those tests with iPhone winning and although not by much, people were praising Apple and screaming about how great iPhone was. Now suddenly the speed is not relevant anymore and there are too many variables on those tests.

Apple really brainwashed the masses.


I was the biggest Apple fan on the planet but at some stage in front of so much lack of quality control and an ecosystem where not a single thing works smoothly as marketed and designed, one must wake up and admit that Apple’s golden days are far behind us.
Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)