Samsung officially announced the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 Edge phones this week at the MWC event in Barcelona. We had some hands-on time with the Galaxy S7 phones at a press event in New York City before the show, and we were impressed with its features and functions, many of which you won’t find on any iPhone. Here’s a breakdown of what the Galaxy S7 can do that the iPhone can’t.
The Galaxy S7 is water-resistant
Sure, Apple added a gasket in the iPhone 6s, but it’s not confident enough to say that the iPhone can be dunked under water and survive.
Samsung, on the other hand, came right out and said the Galaxy S7 is water-resistant. To be specific, it’s rated with IP68 dust and water resistance, which means it can go more than a meter under water for around 30 minutes.
It can charge really quickly
The Galaxy S7 has quick-charging via microUSB. It’ll charge it completely in just an hour and half.
To compare, the iPhone 6s Plus, on the other hand, takes around three hours to charge.
But the main benefit of quick charging is that it can give the Galaxy S7 a big jolt of juice in a short period of time. We could get up to 60% battery life in 30 minutes of charging.
It can charge wirelessly
In fact, it can charge wireless quickly. Samsung claims that its quick wireless charging charges faster than the regular wired charging.
Wired quick-charging is still faster, but wireless charging is a nice feature to have. You can just place your phone on a charging dock and get a boost during the day without thinking about it.
It’s a good way to make sure you’re always topped up with battery.
The Galaxy S7’s camera can auto-focus faster than the iPhone 6s
We pitted the Samsung Galaxy S7’s camera against the iPhone’s on the MWC showroom floor. The S7 was notably quicker at locking onto objects.
It also takes better photos in the dark
Ditto. In our brief side-by-side tests the S7 was superior in low-light situations compared to the iPhone 6s.
You can add more storage with a microSD card
Samsung reintroduced microSD card slot into the Galaxy S7. The slot is incorporated into the SIM card tray and lets you add up to an additional 200 GB.
It has a bigger battery
The standard Galaxy S7 has a 3,000mAh battery and the S7 Edge has a 3,600mAh battery.
To compare, the iPhone 6s has a 1,715mAh battery and the 6s Plus has a 2,750mAh battery.
We haven’t tested out the battery life on the Galaxy S7 smartphones, but they’ll probably last longer than the iPhone considering they’re much bigger than the iPhones’ batteries.
Samsung Pay works on regular credit card readers
Samsung Pay works with almost any credit card reader, even really old ones.
Meanwhile, the iPhone’s Apple Pay only works on newer credit card terminals have have near-field communication (NFC) technology built into them. That means you’ll never be sure if the store you’re walking into supports Apple Pay unless you look around for a sticker saying it does. Super handy when you’re travelling.
It has an “always-on” screen
The “always-on” display on the new Galaxy S7 phones lets you glance at basic information like date, time, and basic information about your notifications without having to wake the phones.
On iPhone, you have to wake the display to check the time or notifications.
The Galaxy S7 Edge has widgets on the curved display’s edges
You can access your favorite apps, contacts, news, and even make shortcuts to actions like composing a text message right from the edge of the Galaxy S7 Edge’s curved screen.
Read next: Samsung Galaxy S7 Vs. Samsung Galaxy S6 [Infographic] | Samsung Galaxy S7 And S7 Edge: Australian Pricing, Specs And Availability
This article originally appeared on Business Insider.
Comments
32 responses to “10 Things The Samsung Galaxy S7 Can Do That The iPhone Can’t”
Comparisons of battery life are meaningless without a comparison of the rate of battery drain. How many hours of music or video play, of playing a high-demand game, or of idling with the screen on will the battery support?
I have a Samsung tablet that I use almost constantly. If I’m just using it as an Ebook reader, the battery lasts something like twelve to fifteen hours. Some games will drain the battery in two.
I’m glad to see that the microSD card support is back. It’s the main reason I bought an S5 rather than an S6 the week the S6 was released.
Particularly if there is an “always on” display
It may be using a display tech with low power consumption like digital paper (which uses no power unless it changes) so the always-on display may not be an issue, power-wise.
Still, we need an apples-to-apples comparison – and the important thing about a battery in a mobile is not its mAh rating but how many hours it will give you in the device. A bit like comparing the Atari Lynx vs. the GameBoy – one reason the Lynx died was its battery consumption was over the moon.
Who cares how big the battery is? How long does it LAST is what matters.
And here in Australia? “metre”
If you’re going to try and look smart at least do it right. It’s Metre anywhere, a Meter is used to measure things, like a Power Meter where as Metre is a measurement of distance, it’s not some US thing, they would have used Feet.
Ooops, before trying to be a smartarse, might pay to do a little research, lest you only become the latter.
The Americans spell it wrong, just like “color” vs “colour”. Seeing “meter” as a reference to distance typically means the article has been copied from a US source.
See: http://grammarist.com/spelling/meter-metre/
and: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metre
I asked my US friend. He said the US use ‘meter’ to describe the distance.
They do use meter, but more often than not, they use other metrics such as feet or yards to describe the distance too.
So can it completely charge in 30 minutes or not? Your first mention says fully charged, your next says 60%? Which is it?
I think you misread Thomas.
“It’ll charge it completely in just an hour and half.”
and then
“We could get up to 60% battery life in 30 minutes of charging.” if you’re in a hurry and can’t wait the full 1 1/2 hours.
They said completely charge in “Hour and half” admittedly not the best wording but still fairly clear.
90 minutes S7, 100 minutes S7 edge
What does it mean when you say
Cause every eftpos terminal here i’ve encountered supports Paypass, which also means it supports Apple pay, is this a US only thing?
They’re talking about the MST (Magnetic Strip Technology) that is built into them. MST will emulate the Magnetic Strip on your card which theoretically allows it to work on ANY machine where you would normally swipe your card as well as those with NFC/Paywave tech, of course you need to be able to put it up against the Strip Reader so it still needs to be accessible, ie. you couldn’t use it on an ATM as you need to insert your card rather than swipe.
Someone did a great video on this in the US where he went around and tested it, seemed to work a lot of the time but was not 100%, but certainly allows more options, especially if you’re travelling to other countries that haven’t quite caught up with current tech and still require you to swipe, plus it means that you’ll be able to use it on larger transactions as well that require you to swipe.
It’s more for the American market. It just works with Magnetic strip readers in addition to NFC readers.
Maybe it’s so thin, it fits into the card slot of older card readers?
Or even swipe it through the slot that reads the magnetic strip?
I’ve often wondered why manufacturers are so keen to make phones thinner / more fragile
Actually, these are nearly a milimetre thicker so they could put a bigger battery in.
And the IPhone has first class support, rather than the third rate support offered for Samsung devices
Don’t worry, the S7 buyers should get the first 6 months of software updates just fine.
EDIT: Accidentally replied, instead of creating anew comment>_>
Nuh uh, the iPhone has both wireless charging and water resistance: http://www.technobuffalo.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/ios-7-waterproof.jpg and http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/embed-md/public/2014/09/22/apple-wave.jpg
For reference, I know they’re both jokes.
This article is spot on. For a while I’ve been trying to tell my friends how much better the S7 Edge is, but when they hear the word ‘Samsung,’ they forget it. This article basically gets everything right. Spot on guys, spot on.
I’ve been a long time iP user, but I must say that the S7 is tempting me to jump ship. A worthy alternative indeed…
me too, and I have the moto 360 watch 2015 and it’s a bit limited on the iphone. But I don’t think I want to spend more than a grand to remedy that
Samsung took a page out of Sony and added a bit extra but the Xperia line has most of these features micro sd and waterproofing (really good feature) for awhile now. I was going to upgrade from z3 to z5 but i might hold out for another couple months/year. Phone itself is great still!
Actually to set things straight, Samsung had those features since the beginning of time, and only took them out with the S6.
They used to always have SD expandable memory, replaceable battery (both features on s1,2,3,4,5). They had these features when everyone else didn’t offer them. Waterproofing is not really new either (s5). Then with the s6, they got rid of those three features (in the name of design)… and now with the s7, they’ve bought back SD expandable memory and waterproofing.
So I’d actually be better off with an s5, because of the replaceable battery?
Time to do some Googling…
my last 2 phones have been xperia z, z3c – the loudspeaker is terrible. And the grommets that ensure they stay waterproof invariably fail (not so much of an issue with the z5)
EDIT: stop effing recycling articles allure media.
I am also a Samsung user but a news I have read on some useful blogs that Apple is going to have something new in its technology to attract is users again and will be getting huge amount of market share.
there is an announcement on the 21st, the rumour is there will be a 4 inch iphone 6S and a normal sized ipad pro.
these articles all talk about shit that we know. the physical differences and stuff. TALK ABOUT how I phones won’t let you.change default apps. or change you keyboard. talk about how Samsung let’s you scroll capture a long webpage into one image. or that you can side load mp3 or any file into your phone and not be forced to use itunes.
or how about how Samsung OCR built in so if I take a picture of text or have an image of text my Samsung will let me copy and paste those texts off of an image. or that Samsung can read my handwriting pretty damn accurately as well. or that I can use OTG adapter to plug almost anything to my phone. external 3TB hard drives. pen drives. USB midi instruments. or that I can plug my Samsung straight to a TV with an mhl to HDMI.
or how about the fact I can move apps to an SDCard AND run it off the sdcard to save space.
I can use my Samsung as a second webcam for my laptop or desktop.
stream to any dlna, upnp, or airplay device.
change display color modes. ultra power save modes
Pro camera mode that let’s me save my pictures in raw format
Samsung also has private mode. not just for web apps but for the entire phone itself.
so much stuff. that Samsung can do that I phones can’t do at all.
custom keyboards and swipe
3rd party default apps
not to mention heart rate sensor
also I can copy any text on screen Cuz some apps or websites wouldn’t let you copy certain texts. but my Samsung I can highlight to copy any text on screen no matter what.
split screen apps and I can also float apps on homepage or anywhere. also float the video player on screen so I can complete other tasks as I keep tabs on my show.