Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge review: Look elsewhere in 2018

In 2016, the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge was the finest smartphone you could buy: the trouble was that, cosmetic differences aside, it was the same as the considerably cheaper vanilla Samsung Galaxy S7. 

Both phones are showing their age now, and while they’re still perfectly servicable now, you’d be brave to lock yourself into a two-year contract in 2018.

So, what are the alternatives? Well, phones have got more expensive now, but while the Samsung Galaxy S9 is currently commanding an expensive £739 fee, the still-excellent S8 has seen considerable price cuts and can now be had for around £450: a bonafide bargain. The good news is that you won’t need to decide between curved screen or non-curved: the S7 was the last generation where it was a choice.

If that feels a bit much for last year’s technology, the OnePlus 6 matches the S9 for performance, and can be had for just £460 SIM-free.

Jon’s original review continues below.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge review: In full

The Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge is the lost flagship of 2016. After the fuss over the launch died down earlier this year, it seems to have been forgotten, shoved to the back of the collective tech-industry consciousness. But it shouldn’t be, because the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge is one of the best phones you can buy right now. There are now several solid reasons, other than good looks, to buy it over its less curvaceous sibling, the Samsung Galaxy S7.

Indeed, on its own, the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge doesn’t look anything special. Slide it up next to the Galaxy S7, however, and you’ll immediately spot the difference. 

READ NEXT: The best phones of 2017 – our favourite smartphones 

It’s a significant 0.4in larger than the standard S7 and, interestingly, a mere 0.2in smaller than the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge+ – Know Your Mobile went as far as to say the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge knocked the “build and design out of the park”.

The other big news is that, although there’s still no removable battery, Samsung has brought microSD expansion and water- and dust-proofing back to its flagship smartphone range. The Samsung Galaxy 7 Edge is compatible with microSD cards up to 200GB in size, with space for the card next to the SIM slot in the drawer that fits in at the top edge, while the phone is rated to IP68. The latter means, technically speaking, that the phone can be immersed completely in water up to 1.5m deep for up to 30 minutes. Drop it in the sink or the bath and it’ll survive, but a trip the bottom of the deep end at the hotel swimming pool might not end quite so well.

Cynics might suggest the lack of these features last year was a deliberate ploy, designed by Samsung to give customers a reason to upgrade this year. However, I believe it’s more likely to be a response to Samsung fans’ outrage following the launch of the S6 and S6 Edge. Removable storage had always been a stalwart of Samsung’s designs until that point – hopefully, this means it will once again become a permanent feature, never to be dropped again.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge: Headline specifications

5.5in Super AMOLED screen, 1,440 x 2,560 Quad HD resolution

Octa-core 2.3GHz Samsung Exynos 8890 processor

32GB storage

Curved edges front and rear

IP68 dust and water resistance

microSD slot

12-megapixel rear camera with f/1.7 aperture, “dual-pixel” sensor and phase-detect autofocus

3,600mAh battery

Always-on screen

Internal liquid cooling

Smaller camera “hump” protrudes only 0.46mm

Price: £639 inc VAT | Buy the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge now from Amazon

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge: Design

So those are the major changes. What about the more minor ones? Well, there are plenty of those to cover, so I’ll start with the design, and it’s very much “as you were” on this front.

There’s the bigger screen, of course, but style-wise the phone looks very close to the S6 Edge. A glossy glass finish sandwiches a gleaming, coloured metallic substrate that catches the light in all the best ways, while the long edges of that 5.5in screen dip away to a slim, aluminium frame that runs all around the edges of the phone.

Eagle-eyed readers will spy that the very edges of the glass at the top and bottom of the phone are softly curved, but other than that – from the front at least – little has changed.

It still picks up unsightly fingerprints like mad, and the buttons and ports remain in the same locations: the volume buttons are on the left edge and the power button on the right, the combined SIM/microSD card drawer are on the top edge and the 3.5mm headphone jack, perforated speaker grille and micro-USB port are on the bottom. Yep, that’s right, there’s no USB Type-C here, presumably because Samsung wanted to ensure compatibility with the Gear VR.

Continues on page 2

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge review: Display and Edge screen

As for the display, Samsung is sticking to the tried and tested. There’s no sign of 4K here (which would be daft, let’s face it); instead, the S7 Edge has “only” a 1,440 x 2,560 display. As usual for Samsung handsets, this uses Super AMOLED technology, which means it looks vibrant, colourful and in-your-face.

Given Samsung’s previous record with smartphone screen quality, it’s no surprise that the Edge’s display performs brilliantly. Under the scrutiny of our X-Rite i1display Pro colorimeter and with auto-brightness switched off, the brightness range runs from 1.7cd/m2 at its dimmest to a maximum of 503cd/m2; both are highly impressive results.

What’s different here is that Samsung is finally taking advantage of the OLED technology’s strengths by implementing an always-on display. This displays the time and recent notifications on the screen, even when the phone is on standby, and there’s a selection of different designs to choose from, including several different clock types, calendars and images.

The difference between this and always-on screen modes on other smartphones – most notably the Motorola Moto X line of handsets – is that it’s actually on permanently. There’s no need to wave your hand at it or nudge the phone to get it to turn on. It’s always there, gleaming out at you.

And then there’s the Edge screen. This first appeared on 2014’s lopsided Galaxy Note Edge, when Samsung endowed it with all sorts of fun capabilities. Samsung scaled things back last year with the S6’s Edge screen, which didn’t do an awful lot, but this year it’s back to full strength.

Drag a finger lightly over the screen’s rounded shoulder to access a double column of contact shortcuts, newsfeed streams and even a series of handy tools – the ruler makes a comeback here, accompanied by a control that allows you to toggle torch mode on and off (and increase or decrease its intensity), and there’s also a compass.

Interestingly, these Edge screens are no longer contained within the Edge as they were on the original Note Edge. Instead, they emerge from it, spilling over onto the main surface of the screen, making it both more readable and more useful.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge review: Performance, storage and gaming

As for performance, that’s pretty much impeccable. In fact, there’s hardly any difference between this handset and the Samsung Galaxy S7 when it comes to raw speed.

That’s what you get when you give two phones exactly the same processor (the octa-core, 2.3GHz Samsung Exynos 8890) the same amount of RAM (4GB) and the same resolution display.

In every test, the S7 Edge performs to the same high standard as the S7, and that means it’s very, very good. Its Geekbench multi-core results are ahead of any other phone we’ve tested, including the otherwise all-conquering Apple iPhone 6s. In other tests, the 6s pulls out a lead, but the S7 Edge and its flat-screened counterpart are faster than any other Android handset.

In day-to-day use, I found general responsiveness to be incredibly good. The phone responded to all gestures instantly, scrolling animations were smooth as silk, and stutter-free playback in the most graphically intensive mobile games was the order of the day.

In slightly bigger news – because, frankly, there’s little need for more mobile power than the S6 Edge offered, let alone this beast of a handset – the battery is significantly larger. 

It’s now 3,600mAh, a full 1,000mAh bigger than the S6 Edge’s comparatively wimpy 2,600mAh, and it lasted an age in our tests. In fact, playing back a video on loop (with the screen brightness set to 170cd/m2), the S7 Edge’s big battery kept on trucking for a huge 18hrs 42mins, a result that puts all its rivals firmly in the shade. Even the iPhone 6s Plus only lasted 14hrs 48mins. It’s a truly stonking result.

There are other performance-specific upgrades to take account of, too. With a renewed focus on mobile gaming, and perhaps also an eye on the problems rival manufacturers’ phones have suffered from overheating, the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge now has an internal liquid-cooling system.

The aim is to prevent the phone from turning into a high-tech hand-warmer while gaming, which subsequently throttles the CPU and GPU speed to keep the phone from crashing.

In practice, it will still heat up if you put it under pressure. Run the full set of GFXBench graphics tests while charging, for instance, or pop the phone in a Gear VR, and the phone will still get uncomfortably warm (I measured it at a peak of 43°C). It’s good to know that Samsung is acknowledging the issue, though, even if not solving it entirely.

There’s more, too. Samsung is also including an app called Game Launcher, which is designed to help with the annoyances of mobile gaming. Fire it up, select a game and you’ll be able to not only cap the resolution and frame rate to conserve battery power, but also access in-game floating shortcut controls that allow you to suppress notifications, take screenshots and capture video of your high scores and achievements.

This doesn’t have any special requirements: your games don’t have to be installed via the Samsung app store, and once you’ve installed the app (it isn’t there by default, but Samsung recommends you install it), it automatically recognises the games you have installed and presents them in a list.

This is useful, but it doesn’t work perfectly all of the time. Some apps that aren’t games appear on the list, while other games don’t appear at all. What’s more, the frame-capping has less-than-desirable effects with some titles. Do this with endless-running game The Pit, and instead of reducing the frame rate, the game simply runs at a slower speed. There’s clearly some work to do with developers here.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge review: A brighter, better camera

All of which brings me to this phone’s biggest advance: the camera. Last year’s S6 camera was a belter and it remains so to this day, so in reducing the resolution from 16 megapixels to 12 megapixels, Samsung is taking a gamble.

Remarkably, it pays off. This is the same resolution as both current iPhones and the superlative Nexus 6P, so it’s not completely without precedent, and I’m glad Samsung hasn’t gone too far as HTC did when it scaled back to a 4-megapixel rear camera on the One a few years back.

The reduction in resolution means the pixels have increased in size, from 1.12um to 1.4um, although that in itself won’t make a huge difference to image quality. The overall size of the sensor is still roughly the same, increasing by only a fraction, from 1/2.6in to 1/2.5in, so the overall light-gathering capacity of the sensor is similar.

It’s the other specification changes that have the greatest impact, and the one that I’m most excited about is that it now has a brighter aperture of f/1.7 (it was f/1.9 on the S6).

What this means in practice is that the camera can, and does, shoot at faster shutter speeds and lower ISO levels in low-light conditions. This, in turn, leads to sharper shots with lower noise levels and cleaner, less blurry images all round.

The other big step forward for the S7 Edge’s camera is that it has a “dual-pixel sensor”, an advance that means faster autofocus than last year’s model.

Samsung demonstrated this at the launch by mounting an S6 Edge and S7 Edge side-by-side in an enclosed, darkened box, then moving a photograph rapidly backwards and forwards, forcing each camera to refocus at the same time.

This is a somewhat artificial experiment, but the S7 Edge did hold a noticeable advantage over the S6 Edge, which hunted back and forth a little longer before locking on.

There was no such hesitation with the S7 Edge, and that’s something I’ve found reflected in everyday use. The camera rarely missed focus and, coupled with the faster shutter speeds in low light, this makes it speedy and impressively dependable.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge: Other software changes

Aside from the introduction of Android 6 Marshmallow, which is welcome but largely obscured by Samsung’s TouchWiz launcher software, there isn’t a whole lot to say about the software side of things.

The things that will make the most difference to how you use your Galaxy S7 Edge are the Edge screen features and, to a lesser extent, the Game Launcher and onscreen tools.

Otherwise, TouchWiz remains divisive as ever – you either love it or hate it – and just as chock full of features. I do like that Samsung has resisted the urge to start filling the phone with preloaded apps, though.

On last year’s S6 handsets, Samsung reduced the number of preinstalled apps dramatically and although there’s still a good selection here, including the full set of Microsoft Office apps, they fill up only a single page of the app drawer.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge: Verdict

Just like its stablemate, the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge is simply superb. It isn’t a huge upgrade on last year’s model, but with improvements all round – a better camera, bigger screen, better Edge screen functions, that microSD slot, weather-proofing and superb battery life – it’s a big enough update to maintain Samsung’s position at the top of the smartphone tree.

The Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge doesn’t quite depose the Nexus 6P from the top of our best smartphones list. It’s a bit too expensive for that

The Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge doesn’t quite depose the Nexus 6P from the top of our best smartphones list. It’s a bit too expensive for that, costing £639 inc VAT at retail, some £190 more than the Google flagship. Although it’s prettier and more capable, it’s not £200 better.

That doesn’t stop it being a great phone, however, and it shouldn’t prevent you from buying one if you can afford it. In fact, of the two S7 smartphones launched this year, it’s clearly the best one. The price differential between the S7 Edge and the standard Samsung Galaxy S7 is only £70 and for a bigger, better, sexier smartphone, that isn’t a bad deal at all.

The best recommendation I can think of, however, is that this is the smartphone I would buy if money was no object; I can think of no stronger endorsement than that.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge vs iPhone 7  and iPhone 7 Plus

When I first reviewed Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus was a thing of rumours and leaks. Now that it’s real, and all the specifications have been confirmed, is Samsung’s flagship still the money-no-object smartphone to buy?

Certainly, a couple of its advantages have been eroded by the iPhone 7. Storage is no longer the problem it once was, with Apple finally kicking the 16GB base model into the long grass. The cheapest £599 iPhone 7 now has 32GB storage, with the two models up the range moving to 128GB and 256GB respectively. There’s still no microSD slot, though, so Samsung retains that edge over its rival.

The other area where the iPhone 7 makes a step up is that it is now, just like the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, dust- and water-resistant. Strictly speaking, the Samsung is a notch more water-resistant than the iPhone 7. It’s rated at IP68 compared with the IP67 of the iPhone 7, the first digit signifying dust-resistance, and the second number denoting the level of water-resistance.

In this case, the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge will put up with being immersed at a depth of up to 1.5m for up to 30 minutes without breaking, while the iPhone 7 can be immersed at a depth of 1m for up to 30 minutes. That’s not a huge difference.

The final feature that might possibly persuade you to switch allegiances to the iPhone 7 Plus specifically, is its dual-camera setup. With one adopting  a standard 28mm lens and the other a 56mm lens, the idea is to offer rudimentary optical zoom, without the loss of resolution that accompanies digital zoom.

Is this enough for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus to overhaul Samsung at the top of the premium smartphone charts? For now, I can’t definitively say as I haven’t tested the new iPhone yet, but it definitely looks as if Apple has closed the gap.

	Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge specifications
Processor	UK spec: Most likely - Octa-core (quad 2.3GHz and quad 1.6GHz), Samsung Exynos 8890 Octa; Other regions - Quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 (dual-core 2.15GHz and dual-core 1.6GHz)
RAM	4GB LPDDR4
Screen size	5.5in
Screen resolution	1,440 x 2560, 576ppi (Gorilla Glass)
Screen type	Super AMOLED, always-on display
Front camera	5MP
Rear camera	12MP (f/1.7, 1.4μ pixel size, 1/2.6in sensor size, phase detect autofocus, OIS, dual-pixel sensor)
Flash	Dual LED
GPS	Yes
Compass	Yes
Storage	32GB
Memory card slot (supplied)	Yes
Wi-Fi	802.11ac
Bluetooth	Bluetooth 4.2 LE, A2DP, apt-X, ANT+
NFC	Yes
Wireless data	4G
Size (WDH)	73 x 7.7 x 151mm
Weight	157g
Operating system	Android 6 Marshmallow with TouchWiz UI
Battery size	3,600mAh