You no longer have to brag about a giant Galaxy Note to use a stylus with your Samsung phone. Launched in February, the Galaxy S21 Ultra also supports Samsung’s S Pen – though you’ll have to buy one and store it separately, because unlike the Note, the S21 Ultra does not have a built-in style slot.
But if you decide to buy an S Pen (or if you already have a Wacom stylus on hand), you can use it to do a bunch of fun things with your S21 Ultra.
You do not need to connect the stylus to your phone; it automatically recognizes the S Pen as you move across the screen. From there, you can see a number of options by tapping the floating button that appears on the screen.
You can take notes and draw the Ultra, and in Live Messages you can draw your own emojis, create GIFs, and scrape notes on photos. By selecting AR Doodle, you draw with the S Pen in a 3D space. Or you can use Smart Select, which lets you select, clip and collect images or videos for quick sharing with friends.
At the moment the S21s are S Pen may not do exactly the same things that Galaxy Note can do, but it is expected that Samsung will release an even more popular and expensive S Pen Pro in the future (although the company has not said yet). With this more advanced stylus, you can use it as a remote control for your phone’s camera and unlock Air Gestures, similar to what you can achieve with the Galaxy Note’s stylus.