Galaxy S6 Edge Plus announced: what you need to know

The Galaxy S6 Edge Plus has just launched, and we have all the key specs, features, and availability information right here.

“The Edge is here to stay,” said Lanh in our Galaxy S6 Edge review, and, several months later, the arrival of a Plus version of the device proves him right. Samsung is betting big on the Edge concept, and for good reason: despite a higher price, demand for the S6 Edge reportedly matched the “regular” Galaxy S6, and many market watchers contended that the S6 Edge is Samsung’s real flagship.

Now Samsung is taking its Edge into phablet territory. In New York, our Lanh Nguyen and Josh Vergara have got their hands on the S6 Edge Plus and Note 5, but for now, let’s go through the key details of the new Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge Plus.

Galaxy S6 Edge Plus specs, features, and software

Even if you’re just vaguely familiar with the original S6 Edge, the supersized Galaxy S6 Edge Plus will be no surprise. In almost every detail, the Plus is a larger S6 Edge, for better or worse.

The biggest deal here is the display: it’s a 5.7-inch Quad HD AMOLED panel, up from 5.1-inch on the S6 Edge. The pixel density went down a notch to 518 ppi – still, that’s at the top of the class and you will probably need a magnifying glass to truly see the difference in crispness between the two displays. Check out our hands-on S6 Edge vs Edge Plus comparison for more.

A bigger screen naturally makes for a bigger device: handling is still pretty good, provided you’re comfortable with large phones. Samsung added a couple of usability features to ease the necessity for finger acrobatics – you can triple tap the home button to bring up one-handed mode (basically, a smaller UI on one side of the phone) and the People Edge drawer can be moved up and down as you please.

The metal and glass build of the S6 Edge Plus is basically identical to that of other Samsung phones in this year’s class, and that means you won’t get a removable battery or microSD card. Just mentioning these omissions can spark raging firestorms in comments sections everywhere, but, at least, we have to appreciate that Samsung is consistent in its decisions.

It looks like the S6 Edge Plus will only be available in 32GB and 64GB options – Samsung dropped the 128GB option for some reason.

The 3,000 battery on the S6 Edge Plus is still pretty great, though the steady march of technology means there are competitors out there that come ahead by a big margin in this department.

In case you need it spelled out, no, there is no S Pen on the S6 Edge Plus – this is not the successor of the Note Edge, so no Air Command and screen doodling for you.

More about the Galaxy S6 Edge Plus build, specs, and features in our hands-on post.

The Galaxy S6 Edge Plus doesn’t bring any big, uhm, pluses on the software side. There are however a couple of new tricks we already mentioned: triple tap to activate one-handed mode (double tapping will still open up the camera) and a more powerful People Edge, which can now include shortcuts to your favorite apps.

Galaxy S6 Edge Plus pricing and availability

The Note 5 and S6 Edge Plus will go on pre-order from today in the US (all major carriers) and will begin shipping from August 20.

As for the price, we expect the S6 Edge Plus to be in the top tier, or around $800. Expect official details soon.

Read more

Check out our other Galaxy S6 Edge and Note 5 content:

• Galaxy S6 Edge Plus hands-on impressions
• S6 Edge vs S6 Edge Plus vs Galaxy S6 Edge
• Galaxy Note 5 hands-on impressions
• Galaxy Note 5 vs Galaxy Note 4

What’s your take?

There you have it: no surprises and no big differences between the S6 Edge Plus and the S6 Edge. That can be good or bad, depending on what you expected from the phone – in this day and age, some people just can’t go back to sub-5.5-inch, and for them, the S6 Edge Plus may be the ideal device. Then again, we also want our phones to surprise and delight us, and there’s very little new here.

What about you? Tell us what you think about the Galaxy S6 Edge Plus in the comments.

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