Make it metal, make it awesome
The wait is nearly over. The Galaxy S6 is (almost) certain to be launched on 1 March at a special ‘Unpacked’ event by Samsung in Barcelona at MWC 2015.
It will also be (again, most likely) joined by the Galaxy S Edge: a curved screen variant of the phone which won’t be sold in as great a volume. Think Samsung Galaxy Note Edge to the Galaxy Note 4.
What does the invite hint at with the curved element, asking what’s next? It’s evocative of the more premium car designs, which surely confirms Samsung is going out all guns blazing around the new metal design.
The bulge is interesting, as it could hint at a larger camera module or a curved display – but why would the invite make the less-popular phone the key item?
Latest updates: On top of the above invite we’ve also got information on a render that promises to be a close approximation of the real thing, a metal frame of the phone and ‘confirmed’ pricing.
We can educatedly guess at the new design: the Samsung Galaxy Alpha tried to fix some of the failings of the Galaxy S5 – plus the Galaxy A3, A5 and A7 options recently announced – so there’s definitely been a quick change at the South Korean brand to try and make its phones look much better.
Cut to the chase
- What is it? The next flagship smartphone from Samsung
- When is it out? Early 2015, probably March or April but maybe even earlier
- What will it cost? A lot, at least as much as the pricey Galaxy S5
Samsung Galaxy S6 release date and price
The Samsung Galaxy S6 will follow last year’s phone and be on show at MWC 2015 – that’s almost certain.
2015’s MWC is set to take place between March 2 and March 5, so as usual Samsung will be showing it off the day before the show starts.
However, despite being announced then it’s not likely to be when it will actually go on sale. The Samsung Galaxy S4 and S5 both launched in April, of 2013 and 2014 respectively, so it’s probable you’ll be able to buy the Samsung Galaxy S6 from April 2015.
There’s a chance it could be delayed, as there have been numerous reports that there are issues with the Snapdragon 810 processor, which is likely to be powering it. Qualcomm claims the chip is on track, but that hasn’t stoppedreports of overheating issues from flooding in.
But it seems that Qualcomm won’t even feature in the Samsung Galaxy S6, with the chipset maker stating a ‘large’ consumer client won’t be using its chips, with Samsung using its own Exynos chip instead to power the phone.
We’ve also got information on the new pricing for the Galaxy S6, and it’s higher than the Galaxy S5, which at launch sold for £579 (around $972 / AU$1048) SIM free.
The new phone will come in at 32GB as a base level (with microSD, presumably), but will cost:
- Samsung Galaxy S6 32 GB: €749 (around £560, $855, AU$1100)
- Samsung Galaxy S6 64 GB: €849 (around £635, $970, AU$1240)
- Samsung Galaxy S6 128 GB: €949 (around £710, $1085, AU$1390)
Given that the specs will presumably be better and that it will likely have a more premium build that higher cost makes sense, but this could rival Apple for the most expensive phone on the market.
Samsung Galaxy S6 design
Samsung needs to sort out the design of the Galaxy S6, and there are (happily) reasons to believe it’s doing just that. There’s every chance that Samsung will mould it on the Samsung Galaxy Alpha, which launched with a metal frame but still kept hold of the polycarbonate rear from the Galaxy S5.
At just 6.7mm the Galaxy Alpha is considerably thinner than the Galaxy S5, and we hope this is a positive sign for the Galaxy S6. In fact even more recentlySamsung has shown off the 6.3mm thick Galaxy A7.
Sources in Samsung’s supply chain have been talking fast and loose about the Galaxy S6, claiming the Galaxy Alpha and Note 4 have tested the waters for Samsung’s metal design ahead of an all-metal flagship in the form of the S6.
But what if Samsung’s feeling that’s not enough? Project Zero is coming, apparently, and not only do we love that name it also heralds Samsung starting again and completely retooling the S6 to be something that even iPhone and HTC lovers can’t keep their paws off.
Given one of the design chiefs at the South Korean firm was shuffled sideways in the aftermath of less-than-expected Galaxy S5 sales, we can really believe this is happening.
Don’t expect a fancy new name to go with it though, as according to SamMobilethe new phone will simply be called the Samsung Galaxy S6.
Dutch website Top Tien Mobiel posted photos supposedly showing a Galaxy S6 prototype, which were sent in by an anonymous source.
The alleged image of the S6 shows a design with extremely thin edges along the left and right sides of the screen, with the front-facing camera now at the centre of the handset.
Since then we’ve seen a render of what it can look like, and a picture of the frame that supposedly will hold the phone… but man, that looks like an Apple iPhone 6, doesn’t it?
Before that leak we had to make do with this interesting concept from Josip Jakubiv – it’s the same mottled back, but with a much larger screen and a refined design – perhaps even a spot of metal there?
Don’t get too excited by all this metal though, because another rumor, this time from the mouth of a “Samsung Electronics official” speaking to DDaily, states that the Galaxy S6 won’t have a full metal jacket after all, but will instead have a metal frame but a glass front and back, possibly a bit like the Sony Xperia Z3.
Supposedly this is to help it stand out from the new Galaxy A series, but standing out by looking less premium would hardly be ideal.
Luckily a different Samsung official, Samsung Mobile Vice President Park Jin Young, was reported by G for Games to have told Korean media that there’s no shortage of metal cases available for S6 production. That means the S6 may launch with a metal unibody after all.
As far as the handset’s back goes, we’ve seen evidence that the flash and heart rate sensor have been moved to the side of the camera module. This evidence has been twofold; first, some alleged Galaxy S6 cases were listed on Amazon:
Then, the very next day, Phone Arena published a photo it says shows some old S6 prototypes with the same rear layout:
In all it seems Samsung really has started from scratch on this one.
Samsung Galaxy S6 screen
There’s no sign that Samsung is ditching Super AMOLED in its screens, so we expect that to make a return in the Galaxy S6.
The resolution will likely get a boost though, as Samsung has already launched the 2560 x 1440 Galaxy Note 4 and even among smaller screen sizes there’s the equally QHD Galaxy S5 LTE-A in South Korea, so we expect the Galaxy S6 to have a resolution at least that high.
In fact Samsung has previously said that it hopes to have smartphones with 4K 3840 x 2160 displays on the market by 2015. It’s possible then that the S6 will leapfrog 2K and go straight to 4K, but with an early 2015 launch expected we’d be surprised.
More likely Samsung will save that for the Galaxy Note 5… plus, surely, that’s getting to the point of just too many pixels in a phone screen?
In any case, SamMobile claims it’s likely to launch with a QHD screen. A second report from Chinese site cnmo.com featured a supposed AnTuTu benchmarking result from the Galaxy S6 that confirmed the display was a 2,560 x 1,440 QHD affair.
We’ve also got wind of a user agent profile from Dutch site TechTastic, which reveals a QHD 1440 x 2560 display for a handset believed to be the Galaxy S6, so it’s looking very likely.
Whether it’s QHD or not the Samsung Galaxy S6 may have a slightly bigger screen than the Galaxy S5. The company has slowly been increasing the size of the screens on its flagships and we wouldn’t be surprised if the Galaxy S6 were to push things up by another 0.1 or 0.2 inches to 5.2 or 5.3 inches. Samsung may decide to go all the way up to 5.5-inches, given the Google Nexus 6 has launched with a 6-inch screen.
If Samsung can shrink the bezel then it could probably even achieve that without increasing the phone’s footprint. On the other hand the Note 4 is no bigger than the Galaxy Note 3 and Samsung’s going to want to keep its two premium brands differentiated, so maybe it will decide that 5.1 inches is the sweet spot.
There’s also a chance that the Galaxy S6 might have a flexible display. Samsung has been looking at this sort of technology for a while and has even recently launched the Galaxy Note Edge: a version of the Note 4 where the screen curves down one side, so it’s possible.
Others have been keen to push this idea, with the rumors that the Note Edge was supposed to feature the dual-bend design, but it was shelved and pushed the to Galaxy S6. It would certainly boost the brand’s presence on the shop shelves.
The curved screen idea has also been pushed by South Korean news outletDaum, which goes on to predict a 2560 x 1440 resolution (the same as the Galaxy Note 4) and a Snapdragon 810 processor.
But we doubt Samsung would equip its flagship with such an untested technology, so we’d expect the S range to stick with a flat screen for at least one more year.
On the other hand we might see both a flat and curved version, much like with the Note 4. Rumors from SamMobile and Business Insider suggest that’s exactly what will happen, with the Galaxy S6 sporting a flat display and a separate Galaxy S6 Edge being launched alongside it, though SamMobile’s source has since backtracked on that particular theory.
GforGames also claims we’ll see two versions of the handset, with the Galaxy S6 Edge being a limited edition, with an apparent sales forecast of ‘just’ 10 million units during 2015.
We can believe it would happen if it was just one variant and it would be cool if the S6 had a bendy screen – something different from the continuously-similar rectangular designs, right?
Recently we’ve heard from Samsung HD Blog that both edges of the Galaxy S6’s display might be curved, though apparently not in the same way as the Galaxy Note Edge, which may mean more subtle curves.
SamMobile is now echoing that, claiming that the phone will be able to make use of the same apps for the edge screen as the Galaxy Note Edge, including a pedometer, news and sports updates and more. By having two curved screens it should also apparently be comfortable to use regardless of whether you’re left or right handed.
Though there are now reports that while Samsung is apparently prototyping versions of the S6 with both one curved edge and even two curved edges the company hasn’t decided which if either of them it will launch.
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