First Look At Samsung’s New Flagships – The Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+

Samsung has launched its new flagship smartphones, the much anticipated Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+ today at the Galaxy UNPACKED 2017 event, held in New York City, New York. The new Galaxy smartphones were first teased at Mobile World Congress on February 26.

The teaser includes a brief video with generic images and created the impression of new aspect ratio - 2:1 instead of the previous Android standard 16:9 including its predecessor, the Galaxy S7. Prior to the launching event, the devices were hit with many rumors and dealt with various leaked information over the internet. Here are the official details about the new Android smartphones, which will hit the market on April 21st this year.

Longer, Brighter and Curved Screen

The Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+ sport a display of 5.8-inch (14.7 cm) and 6.2-inch (15.7 cm) respectively, offering new screen aspect ratio - pushing the screens closer to the top and bottom of the devices. As a result, Samsung logo is no longer features on the front, and the physical home button has been switched into an on-screen icon, similar to Huawei and LG.

Both devices support auto HDR for extra clarity when viewing videos, and the screen will be at the same resolution regardless the size. Both models will also have the curve screen, similar to the Galaxy S6 and S7 Edge models.

Enhanced and Improved Camera

The rear camera for both models remain the same as their predecessor (Galaxy S7) - 12MP and the front camera contains 8MP. However, both sides of the camera have been improved, such as more detailed and faster autofocus for the front camera and improved sharpness and contrast for the rear side by snapping additional frames - allowing more data for extraction.  

Hi Bixby, Can You Help Me?

The most significant improvement that put the Samsung S8 and S8+ ahead from their predecessor is the introduction of Bixby, a new Artificial Intelligent by Samsung. The virtual assistant Bixby works similar to Apple's Siri and Google Assistant, except better. Bixby is activated by a dedicated side button and allows 10 built-in apps to be controlled by voice command.

Bixby can be used to recognize objects seen via the phone's camera - allowing it to tell the owner the info about the landmark and how much a product cost to buy online, for example. For now, Bixby only works with US and Korean voices, but Samsung intends to expand the variation in the future.

Other Improvements

The Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+ are equipped with a more efficient CPU, said to be 10% more powerful than the previous models, combined with a 21% better GPU. The processors implemented a 10 nanometre-chip technology, which sports better energy usage.

The new Samsung smartphones also introduced an iris scanner, for extra security, which allows "eye-prints" to be used as an ID alternative to fingerprints. The fingerprints sensor still exists, only that it has been relocated to the rear side of the devices.

Extra Details

The Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+ both still support the audio jack for headphones, despite Samsung's rival Apple ditched the jack on iPhone 7 and 7 Plus. Both devices feature 4GB of RAM, with Lithium-ion battery capability of 3,000mAh for and 3,500mAh respectively. Micro SD card slot is available, and the internal storage will be 64GB out from the box for both devices.

The Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+ run on the latest Android version - Nougat 7.0. They are both rated IP68, offering dust and water resistant to 1.5 meters deep for 30 minutes.