Top 5 AI Smartphones to Buy in 2025: iPhone 17 Pro, Galaxy S25 Ultra and More

The “AI-feature” wave is not new. At least, not in smartphones. I have been hearing AI-this and AI-that ever since I reviewed my first few smartphones around a decade back. Sure, back then, “AI” meant little more than camera filters or battery optimization tricks. But it is 2025 now, and AI is the foundation of any new product in the tech world. And so, the new wave of premium AI smartphones in 2025 goes far beyond gimmicks. These embed powerful AI models directly into the device.

We’re talking on-device large language models, real-time multimodal processing, AI-driven security, and assistants that feel closer to copilots than chatbots. Need examples? Apple’s iPhone 17 can now generate entire videos with its neural engine. Google’s Pixel 10 taps into Gemini AI for real-time search and translations. Similarly, Samsung’s Galaxy S25 Ultra pushes multimodal note-taking and image editing to new heights. Meanwhile, Chinese heavyweights like Xiaomi, OnePlus, and Oppo are fusing cutting-edge hardware with AI-first software.

So, it is crystal clear that after curved OLED displays and superpowerful multi-lens cameras, smartphones now hail AI as the next big revolution. And rightly so – AI, as it stands today, has the power to supercharge your daily functions.

If you know it and seek one of the perfect AI smartphones in 2025, here are your best options. I have cherry-picked this list, ignoring any budget or category constraints, so that it only includes the best AI smartphones out there. So go wild and find the right AI smartphone for yourself today without a worry.

1. Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra

Price: Rs 1,23,499

Samsung has been a clear frontrunner in bringing cutting-edge smartphone technologies to the mainstream. Folding displays, ultra-zoom capabilities, and now AI, you name it, and you will find a Samsung flagship offering it all. In this case, it is the Galaxy S25 Ultra that takes the reins.

At its heart, the S25 Ultra carries 2 powerful AI engines, the first of which is the Galaxy AI found on all Samsung smartphones. To further complement it, the Samsung flagship also comes with Google’s Gemini AI integrated within the device. Here is a roundup of some of the top AI features between the two, as seen on the Galaxy S25 Ultra.

Galaxy S25 Ultra: AI Features

• Seamless Actions: The most exciting AI feature I’ve found to date. Seamless Actions on the S25 Ultra lets you type or say a single request to Gemini by the press of a button. The then phone stitches multiple actions together seamlessly. Think about asking it to “find that café from yesterday’s reel and book me a table,” and the S25 Ultra does the legwork across apps. Similarly, you can pause a video, extract a location from it, and save it straight into your notes, without any copy-pasting.
• Circle to Search: Another feature on the S25 Ultra that went viral for all the right reasons. Circle to Search lets you find information around any media instantly. Simply long-press the home button and circle a paragraph, a word, or even music playing inside an app. Gemini will quickly find all the information you need around it. It can even translate entire text on screen using this simple tap and circle.
• AI ProVisual Engine: The camera on the S25 Ultra is supercharged with AI, and hence, automatically enhances textures, colors, and even lighting balance in real time. This basically means that the phone fine-tunes details so photos look polished without you having to tweak settings.
• ProScaler: Low-resolution images and videos get an instant facelift. This AI upscaler intelligently adds sharpness and depth, so even older media or zoomed-in shots feel crisp and natural rather than pixelated.
• Now Brief: Imagine waking up and your phone already has a short, personalized digest waiting for you. From the day’s weather to your meeting schedule and even a nudge about fitness goals, this AI-driven brief is meant to help you step into the day prepared.
• Now Bar: A small but smart layer built into the UI, the Now Bar constantly keeps context at your fingertips. Instead of hopping across apps, you get quick access to the most relevant updates and shortcuts as you go about your tasks.
• Audio Eraser: Editing sound on your videos is no longer a pro-level task. The AI tool classifies background noises like wind, traffic, chatter, and erases them cleanly, keeping only what you want people to hear.
• Smart Search in Gallery: This eliminates endless scrolling to find “that one photo.” So now, you can just say, “show me sunsets in Bali,” and the Gallery surfaces the exact shots, thanks to AI-powered natural language search.
• On-Device Personalization with Knox Vault: Many of these AI tricks run locally on your phone. This ensures your personal data, like routines, photos, or searches, stay protected within Samsung’s Knox Vault, while still making the AI feel like it “knows” you better over time.

Other than these features, the Galaxy S25 Ultra also comes with 6 months of Google AI Pro subscription, including 2 TB of cloud storage, and access to Veo3 video generation AI.

In short, there is a lot of AI to explore on the S25 Ultra. Sure, it might seem like a lot in one go, but once you get used to it, the unsaid king of Android smartphones is sure to save you hours of tedious work with its top-of-the-line AI abilities.

Galaxy S25 Ultra: Specifications

2. Apple iPhone 17 Pro

Price: Rs 1,34,900

If there’s one company that knows how to make AI feel invisible yet indispensable, it’s Apple. With the iPhone 17 Pro Max, Apple certainly doubles down on its “Apple Intelligence” suite. It intends to make the experience less about gimmicks and instead, more about subtle, life-changing features that blend into daily use. So, no showing off AI, but making it work for you without friction.

The AI features on the iPhone 17 Pro Max are tightly woven into iOS, thus ensuring speed, reliability, and most importantly, the privacy that Apple is known for. Here’s a look at some of the most standout AI tricks on the new iPhone:

iPhone 17 Pro Max: AI Features

• Apple Intelligence: Apple Intelligence now includes smarter writing tools across Mail, Notes, and Messages. Further, it now lets you create images that adapt to your prompts. However, the best part is that the all-new AI layer on iPhone runs most tasks on-device, prioritizing privacy.
• Genmoji: Forget static emojis. With AI, you can now create personalized emojis (called Genmojis) just by describing what you want. Whether it’s “a panda eating pizza” or “a cricket-playing astronaut,” the iPhone whips up unique designs in seconds.
• Image Playground: A dedicated space for playful creativity, Image Playground lets you generate custom images directly within Messages or Notes. So, it is perfect for quick visual ideas, memes, or simply to spice up your chats with AI-created art.
• Smart Writing Tools: Built across iOS 19, these tools help rewrite emails for tone, summarize long passages, or even suggest replies.
• Siri Reinvented: With deep Apple Intelligence integration, Siri is now context-aware like never before. Ask follow-ups, reference items from your screen, or even delegate multi-step tasks without having to re-explain everything from scratch.
• Photo Editing with AI: The Photos app now suggests edits like object removal, background swaps, and lighting adjustments automatically. Want that photobomber out of your beach picture? A single tap does the trick.
• App Integrations: Calendar, Safari, and even Apple Music use AI cues to deliver proactive suggestions. From drafting agendas for meetings to surfacing playlists that match your mood, Apple ties it all together without making you feel overwhelmed.

Other than these, the iPhone 17 Pro Max also benefits from Apple’s ecosystem edge: seamless integration across Mac, iPad, and Watch means your AI tools follow you everywhere.

In short, Apple’s flagship makes a strong case for being among the most refined AI smartphones of 2025. It may not scream “AI” at every corner like some rivals, but its intelligence is always there in a subtle, private, and insanely useful way.

iPhone 17 Pro: Specifications

3. Google Pixel 10 Pro

Price: Rs 1,09,999

Google has long treated photography as its calling card. Following those lines, the company leans in deeper with the Pixel 10 Pro, making AI the camera’s co-pilot and not just a backup feature. With its Tensor G5 chip and tight Gemini integration, this phone does more than snap pictures; it helps you take way better ones, and edit them in an original-like capacity.

But as for AI abilities in smartphones go, here is what the Pixel 10 Pro brings to the table.

Pixel 10 Pro: AI Features

• Magic Cue: The Pixel 10 Pro watches your day carefully, so it can jump in at exactly the right moment. A friend texts asking for flight details. Magic Cue will surface your ticket info on the call screen automatically. It’s a nudge before you even ask for help.
• Talk with Gemini Live: It is one of the most novel AI features you will ever find on a smartphone, because with the Pixel 10 Pro, you can simply point your camera at anything around you and then start a live conversation with Gemini about it. For example, think instant explainers on landmarks, products, or even that gadget in your friend’s hand.
• Camera Coach: Probably the smartest move here. Camera Coach uses Gemini models to analyze your scene in real time and offer tips before you click. These include suggestions on framing, lighting tweaks, better angles, and which mode to use. It’s like having a photography mentor in your viewfinder.
• Add Me / Auto Best Take: Group photos are smarter with the Pixel 10 Pro. “Add Me” ensures you’re not left out, even if you are clicking the photo. Meanwhile, Auto Best Take captures multiple frames when you click and picks the one where everyone’s looking their best.
• Scene-aware suggestions in editing: After the shot, Gemini helps with conversational edits in Google Photos. Want to remove a fence? Just ask. Change lighting? Command it. These are AI tools built into functions you already use.
• Circle to Search: Another Pixel hallmark. Just as with the Galaxy S25 Ultra, long-press, circle any object/text/media in your frame, and the Pixel 10 Pro fetches related info instantly. It ties camera, search, and generative models together.
• Pro Res Zoom up to 100×: Want that ultra-zoom shot? The Pro model uses AI to upscale and reconstruct details even at high zoom levels, intelligently filling in missing pixels to keep images sharp.
• Video Boost & Stabilization: Motion scenes, for instance, get a cinematic flair. Meanwhile, AI works behind the scenes to stabilize footage, adjust exposure mid-shot, and smooth out shakes automatically. As a result, you get the pro-level video shot that the Pixel series is famous for.
• AI-powered Video Creation: You can create a high-quality short video while adding natural-sounding audio to it simply by describing your idea. Alternatively, you can upload an image, explain the scene you want, and then watch your photo come alive in motion.
• AI + 7 Years of Updates: Google commits to long-term improvements via Pixel Drops, pushing new AI and camera features over time. That means the phone you buy today can evolve for years.

The Pixel 10 Pro is definitely one of the smartest smartphones you will come across, thanks to its deep AI integration across apps and components. Other than the massive AI capabilities on board, Google also offers 1 year of Google AI Pro (worth Rs 23,400) with the Pixel 10 Pro. It will continue on a subscription basis afterwards, but for the first year, you can easily make use of the powerful features in the Gemini app and 2 TB of cloud storage for absolutely free.

Pixel 10 Pro: Specifications

4. Xiaomi 15 Ultra

Price: Rs 1,09,999

Xiaomi has always flirted with a camera-first design, but with the 15 Ultra, that flirtation is full commitment. The phone looks like a high-end camera because it practically is one. From its massive circular camera module to refined textures, the phone signals that photography and AI are at its soul. Behind that design is a powerhouse: Snapdragon 8 Elite, HyperAI, and deep integration with Google Gemini.

With this combination, here are some of the cutting-edge AI features on the Xiaomi 15 Ultra.

Xiaomi 15 Ultra: AI Features

• Xiaomi HyperAI (Multimodal Assistant): HyperAI is Xiaomi’s own AI layer built to handle text, images, and sound in one fluid system. It’s deeply woven into the OS, enhancing everything from writing tools to creative tasks. Here is what it includes.
  – AI Writing Assistance across the phone. Helpful for summarising articles, organizing notes, spellchecking emails, and more.
  – AI Speech Recognition to convert speech to text, generate summaries and translate text.
  – AI Interpreter for real-time translations across face-to-face interactions, phone calls, or online meetings.
  – AI Search to find what you are looking for within the phone using natural language prompts.
  – AI Dynamic Wallpapers that bring static photos to life with animation.
• Gemini + Circle to Search: Xiaomi brings Google’s powerful visual search tool with “Circle to Search.” Just circle an area on your screen or media, and Gemini retrieves context-aware info.
• AI Video Generator (HyperAI): One standout in Xiaomi’s AI ambition is built-in video generation, because you can upload an image or describe a scene, and then HyperAI will animate it into a short video with natural sound.
• On-device AI & Efficiency Gains: The 15 Ultra is optimised for AI workloads: Xiaomi claims AI performance gains of +105%, while also increasing power efficiency by ~45%.

The Xiaomi 15 Ultra may be built to look like a pro camera, but behind that lens lies deeply ambitious AI. With HyperAI and Gemini pulling the strings, it’s a phone designed to adapt to your needs and surprise you every day with what it can do.

Xiaomi 15 Ultra: Specifications

5. OnePlus 13

Price: Rs 72,999

The very reason for OnePlus’ rise to fame was its “Flagship Killer” tag that lives to this day. Only now, it has a new weapon in its arsenal for killing flagships – Artificial Intelligence. With the OnePlus 13, the company leans hard into its AI ambition. You’ll see Google Gemini baked in, but the real story is the hybrid of OnePlus’s own AI toolkit with Gemini’s muscle. Below is a breakdown of what the latest killer of flagship smartphones offers in AI, and what’s still on the roadmap.

AI Features in OnePlus 13

• Google Gemini: The backbone of generative AI on this device: powers text understanding, content creation, and integration with OnePlus AI tools.
• AI Search: Search across your phone using AI, with natural language queries instead of keyword hunts.
• AI Detail Boost: Enhances image details intelligently, bringing out texture in low-light or soft-focus shots.
• AI Unblur: Cleans up blur from motion or shaky captures to make imperfect shots usable.
• AI Reflection Eraser: Removes reflections from glass, windows, surfaces, ideal for shooting through car windows or screens.
• AI Notes: A smart notes app that combines text, voice, images, AI suggestions, and auto formatting to boost your note-taking flow.
• AI Plus Mind (Coming Soon): OnePlus’s native AI brain for coordinating system features. When active, it’ll likely unify AI tools under one dashboard.
• AI VoiceScribe (Coming Soon): Automatic transcription and voice note generation from your speech, with Gemini-level accuracy.
• AI Translation (Coming Soon): Real-time translation for text, voice, or even objects seen through your camera.
• AI Reframe (Coming Soon): Recompose your photos automatically by cropping, shifting perspective, or reframing for better balance.

The OnePlus 13 doesn’t just ride the Gemini wave; it layers in its own AI tools to finesse your daily life. Some features are still on deck, but even right now, the fusion of OnePlus’s vision with Google’s foundation shows promise for an AI experience that feels truly native and not tacked-on.

OnePlus 13: Specifications

Conclusion

Here you have the 5 clear winners of the AI smartphone race, and this race has inadvertently started across the industry. Since people increasingly want their tedious tasks cut down using AI, it will be interesting to see how smartphone companies continue to find innovative ways to do the same.

For now, this list offers you the best of AI features available among smartphones. In case you wish to have this list for a particular price range, let us know in the comments below, and we shall make sure to come up with an equally solid list for that budget in the near future. Until then!