This post originally went live in March. We have now updated it with prices and our full review impressions.
The Samsung Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge are available to buy today (April 10). Here's an updated account of everything you need to know about the smartphone, which earned a prestigious five-star rating in our full review.
Samsung's Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge first broke cover on the eve of the Mobile World Congress in March, bringing to an end months of leaks and speculation.
The handsets are everything we hoped they would be, combining premium design with cutting-edge specs and refined functionality.
Screen: Edging out the competition
There's one thing that makes Samsung's latest smartphones stand out - and it's a rather significant design feature.
The Galaxy S6 Edge sports a display that curves along both sides, a concept the firm experimented with when it introduced the Galaxy Note Edge last year.
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This gives the phone a striking bezel-free design, but there's functionality there too, as the dual edges display notifications and supplement certain apps.
Here's the thing, the Edge has a couple of main uses, but it's not really there to be massively functional... That's fine though, because everyone likes beautiful things, and this is one of the most beautiful phones we've ever seen.
Both devices have extra-durable 5.1-inch Super AMOLED displays made from the latest Corning Gorilla Glass 4, offering a resolution of 2560x1440 and 577ppi.
When it comes to screens, Samsung does know its stuff. The display on the S6 Edge is really lovely.
Build quality: More solid than ever
Taking user feedback on board, Samsung has finally ditched the polycarbonate design of its previous flagships in favour of metal materials and a glass body.
Like all great phones, it's a handset that makes you want to feel it. You want to use it purely because the design rewards your fingers.
The Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge will be available in colourful jewel tones, including White Pearl, Black Sapphire, Gold Platinum, Blue Topaz and Green Emerald.
The standard model measures in at 143.4 x 70.5 x 6.8mm and weighs 138g, while the Edge measures 142.1 x 70.1 x 7.0mm and tips the scales at 132g.
Hardware: Range-topping specs
The Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge come with heavyweight innards, boasting octa-core Exynos processors with four 2.1GHz cores and four 1.5GHz cores, switching to the latter to conserve battery life when carrying out less power-intensive tasks.
The S6 is clearly one of the most powerful phones on the market, and it will blow pretty much anything else out of the water. Flipping through the menus and home screens, there is no lag or slowdown whatsoever.
Samsung's chipset is backed up by 3GB of RAM in both models, while storage options are 32GB, 64GB and 128GB. However, microSD expansion is no longer supported.
The Galaxy S6 runs off a 2,550mAh battery which, for the first time in a flagship Samsung smartphone, is non-removable and includes wireless charging, compatible with any charging mat that supports the WPC and PMA standards.
Battery life is something of a surprise for a device with a modest capacity of 2600mAh. We got all day out of the phone most of the time. Sometimes, if you use it a lot more, you might find it giving up early evening, but that's not a total disaster.
Samsung claims that the handset powers up 1.5 times faster than the Galaxy S5, offering four hours of usage after just ten minutes of charge.
The Galaxy S6 Edge uses a larger 2,600mAh power cell that includes the same rapid charging and wireless functionality.
Both devices include an array of sensors, including an accelerometer, a light sensor, a gyroscope, a proximity sensor, a compass, a barometer, and a fingerprint scanner.
Camera: "Utterly magnificent"
The Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge are kitted out with capable cameras on both sides, with a 16-megapixel sensor on the rear and a 5-megapixel sensor on the front.
The inclusion of F1.9 lenses help the devices produce superior image output to many of their competitors, even in low-lit conditions, while Auto Real-time High Dynamic Range, Smart Optical Image Stabilisation, and IR Detect White Balance will ensure photos are sharp and crisp.
Users can launch the camera app in just 0.7 seconds from any screen with a double press of the home button, handy when you need to capture an image quickly.
The rear-mounted 16-megapixel shooter on the S6 is, like the Note 4's, utterly magnificent. Photos looks amazing from this phone - and even in less than optimal conditions, they look a lot better than the results from other phones.
Mobile payments and enhanced security
Along with the standard connectivity options, the latest Galaxy flagships include NFC tech for powering Samsung Pay, the company's answer to Apple Pay.
Samsung wants to make mobile payments more accessible to merchants and customers by basing its system on both NFC and a new technology called Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST).
The firm has partnered with MasterCard and Visa to launch MST, and is also working with the likes of American Express and Bank of America to roll it out further.
Samsung Pay will launch in the US and South Korea later this year, before coming to other territories.
The handsets are protected end-to-end courtesy of Samsung's KNOX platform, which offers real-time protection against malicious threats, while the Find My Mobile feature secures lost devices.
Operating system: Slicker but still not perfect
The Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge will ship with Google's Android 5.0 Lollipop on board, along with a revamped version of the TouchWiz user interface.
The new TouchWiz takes a streamlined approach, minimising the amount of pop-up messages and cutting back on the bloatware that gobbled up an alarming amount of storage space on previous Galaxy flagships.
Pre-installed software and services include S Health 4.0, Samsung Pay, Smart Manager, Sound Alive+, Sound Alive+, Themes, Quick Connect, Private Mode S Finder, and S Voice.
Microsoft apps OneNote and OneDrive also come preloaded, with the latter offering users 115GB of free cloud storage space for two years, which should make up for the absence of microSD.
Google mobile services Chrome, Drive, Photos, Gmail, Google, Google+, Google Settings, Hangouts, Maps, Play Books, Play Games, Play Newsstand, Play Movie & TV, Play Music, Play Store, Voice Search and YouTube are also installed out of the box.
When can I get them?
The Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge will be available in numerous countries, including the UK, from April 10. The Galaxy S6 Edge will cost more than the standard model.
In the UK, the standard Samsung Galaxy S6 costs between £599 and £739. The S6 Edge has prices starting at £760. If you after a contract, we've collected the best deals that UK networks are offering on the two phones.
