Samsung makes the Galaxy Note8 Official

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NEW YORK CITY—We're live from New York, where Samsung has taken the wraps off its new flagship device, the Galaxy Note8.

Samsung changed everything about the Galaxy S line earlier this year, and those changes are all making the jump to the bigger Note model. You get an extra-tall display with on-screen navigation buttons and slim bezels. The fingerprint reader has been moved to the back, next to the camera components. There's also an iris scanner, a dedicated hardware button for Samsung's "Bixby" voice assistant, and compatibility with Samsung's "Dex" desktop dock.

Galaxy Note8 in Orchid Gray. (credit: Samsung)

So what is actually different from the Galaxy S8, which launched almost five months ago? Well, first, it's slightly bigger. While the Galaxy S8+ topped out at 6.2-inches, the Note 8 bumps up to 6.3-inches. On the back there's Samsung's first dual-camera design, pairing a wide-angle camera with a telephoto one with 2× optical zoom. Both have optical image stabilization, something Samsung claims is a first. Samsung has a number of trick features using the dual cameras, such as fine control over depth-of-field and simultaneous dual captures to take a whole scene wide angle shot at the same time as taking a close-up detailed shot.