Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge: Thin For Its Own Sake, But Few Compromises

Galaxy S25 Edge display at Samsung Galaxy Unpacked, January 2025

When Samsung teased the Galaxy S25 Edge at its spring Unpacked event, a scrum of rabid journalists and content creators jostled around the display to get a picture of it. However, the tech press is easily excited by anything that looks different. Smartphones are a mature product category, foldables aren’t new anymore, and today’s AI hasn’t dramatically changed how we use our phones (yet?). So, really, anything that looked new and different was going to get a lot of attention. Tonight, Samsung provided full details on the new 5.8mm smartphone and opened up pre-orders. Will consumers be as excited to buy one as the tech press is to cover it?

If consumers do want a Galaxy S25 Edge, they’ll be giving up less than you might think to get it. The Galaxy S25 Edge is a proper flagship phone, with nearly the same specs as the $1,000 Galaxy S25+, including Qualcomm’s best Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset and an even higher resolution 200 MP main camera (compared to the Galaxy S25+’s 50 MP unit). Like the Galaxy S25+, the Galaxy S25 Edge also features a second, wide angle camera, and a large 6.7” 1 – 120Hz AMOLED display on the front. The usual accoutrements of a flagship phone, including IP68 water resistance, wireless charging, and the complete suite of Google and Samsung AI features are included as well. Some of the wow factor will be mitigated if you put a case on it; Samsung is using Corning Gorilla Glass Ceramic 2 on the front in case you want to go caseless. Samsung told me that the Galaxy S25 Edge passed the same durability tests it subjects the rest of the Galaxy S25 family to.

There are two obvious sacrifices: a smaller 3900 mAh battery (down 1,000 mAh from the Galaxy S25+) and a $100 higher price point. If U.S. carriers offer similar incentives to other Galaxy S phones, the price delta will be negligible for those who want something different. We’ll have to wait to get hands-on to be certain, but with a 3900 mAh cell, efficient Qualcomm silicon, and variable refresh rate display, the Galaxy S25 Edge should still have solid one-day battery life.

Aside from style, there is no unmet need that a thinner phone fills. But saying, “aside from style,” is silly, because style is the entire point of the Galaxy S25 Edge. Thin gadgets are cool. This particular thin gadget doesn’t sacrifice that much in power or capability to hit its size and weight goals. With tariff rates fluctuating daily and consumer uncertainty at high levels, this may not be the best time to launch a fashion gadget. I expect the Galaxy S25 Edge to be a low-volume halo device that garners additional interest in the rest of the Galaxy S25 line. However, there is always the chance that once consumers get hands on with a Galaxy S25 Edge at retail, they’ll want one. After all, that’s what happened in 2004 when Motorola focused on creating a style-first super-thin clamshell, called it a Razr, and sold 130 million of the things.

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