Gadgetory

Samsung they're the current mark leader in the smartphone world even as we speak its latest advices have set the bar high for everyone else including design now they've come a long way just because for a long time there they weren't even thought of as great designers in order to understand how they got to whether that now we have to look back so here's the history of Samsung's Android designs it wasn't until 2009 when we saw Samsung's first Android phone which was a good few months after HTC's t-mobile g1 Samsung's response was with the Samsung GTI 7500 or the first Samsung Galaxy without the S of course it was an all-plastic affair with several physical buttons which took design cues from its touch screen feature phones later on in 2009 the u.s. finally saw its first Samsung Android phone with the behold - again it didn't stray far with its design with its all plastic casing they did however change things up with the Samsung moment because it was a landscape QWERTY slider which some thought to be response to the t-mobile g1 in the spring of 2010 the company announced its first real Android contender with the Samsung Galaxy S or the GTI 9000 motorola was coming off the success of the Droid and HTC with the hero the Galaxy S was a totally transformed phone adopting any thinner chassis however it was still made out of plastic but undeniably better-looking than its previous efforts funny things that it drew comparisons with the iPhone for the US launch of the Galaxy S we saw a slew of variants catering to each carrier AT&T Samsung Captivate was unique looking for its carbon fiber pattern rear cover Sprint's ambiguously named Epic 4G featured a slide-out landscape QWERTY keyboard and a t-mobile and Verizon versions were pretty faithful to the originals design with a vibrant and fascinate respectively the Samsung continuum was another Galaxy S variant but it's remembered by its then different secondary tech on display that secondary display is widely considered as the precursor to today's edge panel in the Samsung Galaxy edge devices but back then it was seen more as a novelty ending the year Samsung was commissioned to make the second Nexus the Google Nexus S to be exact you think that it would been treated to an original design but that didn't turn out like that it was yet another Galaxy S look-alike with its glossy all plastic construction it was a far cry in design compared to the Nexus One instead it introduced a curved glass that covered the display staying on track the Galaxy S 2 arrived in early 2011 fashioning together the skinniest chassis in a phone at the time besides that it pretty much lay true to the all plastic design DNA that Samsung has been exhausting but it was a bit more rectangular looking and wider something big shook things up around the middle of 2011 the original Samsung Galaxy Note introduced us to the term phablet it was a totally new segment since it bridged a smartphone and compact tablet into one singular device the design was notable for its sheer size basically a super-sized looking version of the galaxy s2 it also reintroduced and popularized the stylus with its pressure-sensitive as pen after the subdued tone of the Nexus S the previous year my name was shot that Google reached out to Samsung again to make the next Nexus this time though they deliver the goods with the Samsung Galaxy Nexus it was a totally different looking phone boasting a cleaner finish by not having any sort of capacitive or physical buttons on its facade its most important design attribute was the so-called hyper skin finish found on the back of the phone it definitely gave the phone a significantly grippier feel and overall the design was a step forward things got better for Samsung with the Galaxy s3 it forged a new design that brought on several tweaks to differentiate itself from its predecessor the rounded corners of the s3 gave it a friendlier look one that was noted for being inspired by nature you see that in chassis with its pebble S shape underneath it although it was still polycarbonate plastic but with a hyper glazed finish that made it look last year the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 featured a a 5.5 inch screen a step up over its predecessor and it followed the galaxy s3s design with its narrower home button slightly rounded edges and a good old polycarbonate for its chassis the Samsung Galaxy s4 came roaring onto the scene in 2013 cementing Samsung's status as the elite smartphone maker in the world from design aspect there really wasn't much to be fired about since it looked very much like ps3 instead its most remarkable for the amount of features they were able to cram into the phone like the hand waving air view gestures the IR blaster and the eye tracking movement for vertical scrolling within the web browser at a corporate all though the phone's design was still underwhelming if the note was deemed too big for you then the galaxy mega was clearly not something you would have gone after the phone itself was obnoxiously large with its massive 6.3 inch display its overall design however borrowed heavily from the galaxy s4 another interesting design came with the samsung galaxy s4 zoom it was a phone camera hybrid because of the 16 megapixel one over 2.3 3-inch BSI sensor with 10 times optical zoom that was stuffed into its body it looked like a chunkier s4 because of that camera now always the one to go bigger the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 of things with its 5.7 inch 1080p Super AMOLED display interestingly they gave it a sophisticated look by outlining the rear faux leather cover with a stitched pattern it's subtle but one that's different from the norm from Samsung foundationally the bone was still mostly plastic but tweaks give the note 3 that business esque look and feel another major design change came with the announcement of the galaxy s5 the biggest addition to design was the introduction of a water-resistant construction giving it that ip67 certification yes it was still constructed primarily out of plastic but it wasn't as slippery as previous Galaxy S smartphones because of the dimpled pattern design of its rear cover even more impressive the S I was just a monster of a high-end phone that packed an exorbitant amount of features consisting of things like an IR blaster heart rate sensor and yes a fingerprint sensor it seemingly put other competing smartphones to shame now despite the variety of goodies in tow the design was still nothing to gloat about that much and that came the smartphone that totally changed everything for Samsung the Galaxy alpha it's a homework device in the company's history shedding the all plastic construction that Samsung had tirelessly exhausted the Galaxy alpha radiated with an indulgent glow like no other before it in Samsung's stable just because it felt like a premium smartphone for a change by featuring a real metal trim bezel in a compact body at a time it was without question the best design phone out of Samsung's camp they made sure to keep up to the new theme by giving the Galaxy Note 4 the same treatment it also introduced a shiny metal trim bezel as well as having the same faux leather casing with its rear cover if that was enough they also introduced the Galaxy Note edge with its curved edge screen along the right edge finally Samsung went back to the drawing board with its sixth generation flagship Samsung Galaxy s6 and s6 edge ditched plastic entirely opting instead to go with glass and metal you could say that the s6 line looked alien given that it didn't look like anything previously put out by the company between the two smartphones the s6 edge received praise for how it looks slicker with its dual curved edges most people familiar with the flagship line were probably thrown off by the new metal and glass construction frankly they screen premium everywhere but they no longer offered a water-resistant construction or expandable storage now some folks were a bit disappointed by this but the outcome was still largely positive for Samsung once fall came around the samsung galaxy note 5 and the galaxy s6 edge+ both made their appearances to the public they were big bones naturally but they systematically employed Samsung's your design language they really weren't all that different from the s6 line apart from the massive sizes but the note 5 specifically featured rounded edges along the back that made it feel more ergonomic in the hand all this leads us to where we're at now the Samsung Galaxy s7 and s7 edge have both launched bringing along the same but slightly tweaked premium design language that's now Samsung's DNA but listen to some of the criticism that came with the s6 lines revamped design the previous year by bringing back water resistance and expandable storage the phones are absolutely gorgeous but they're made better by their strong overall performances and rich features so obviously Samsung has come a long way since the early days too now they've grown up and they matured so the designs are now coveted so if you guys want to learn more about any of the phones and devices I talked about in this video please check them out at our website Android Authority comm this is John Velasco signing out