I spent an hour with the Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge – here’s my verdict on the new super-thin model

Long rumoured, several times previewed and now finally here – the Galaxy S25 Edge is a full-blown flagship-level Galaxy smartphone that has been flattened a little. And it is a little, because despite the 5.8mm thickness, it’s only 1.4mm thinner than the standard Galaxy S25 and 1.5mm thinner than the S25+.

As I found out during a preview event in London, it’s best to think of it as a combination of the features of the Galaxy S25 and S25 Ultra. And one of those features is the pricing which is very premium for the respective 256 and 512GB versions.

• 256GB: $1,099, $1,099, €1,249
• 512GB: $1,219, $1,219, €1,369

The S25 Edge release date is set for 30 May. You can pre-order the Galaxy S25 Edge from Samsung US or Samsung UK

A new Galaxy Club will launch with the Galaxy S25 Edge, which offers early access and discounts for upgrades; you’ll get a minimum of 50% back for your old device.

The pricing is more than a little eye-watering, but Samsung is banking on you not being too fussed about cost if you’re in the market for this phone. So the questions are plenty, but I feel two stand out to me. Who on earth is it for? And will the battery life be any good?

Design and display: a case for no case

This must be a phone for the case-phobic. If you’re going to buy one of these and put it in a case – well, that would be absolutely pointless as you might as well go and buy an S25 or S25+.

t’s certainly not a phone that’s been designed as a smaller option since it has a very standard 6.7in display which is capable of 2600 nits of peak brightness.

Corning Gorilla Glass Ceramic 2 has just been announced with increased durability – it can withstand multiple drops onto concrete from a 1m height and energy is dissipated through the crystal to prevent cracking, It makes its debut on the Galaxy S25 Edge.

And because a titanium frame is used, it’s strong but also very light at 163g (the also 6.7in S25+ is 190g). There is clearly a risk of a ‘bendgate’ style story to appear, but it would surely be less likely by using titanium. It remains IP68 rated, which is quite a feat.

The S25 Edge is available in three colours as you can see here – titanium silver, jet black, and icy blue. The silver is my favourite, but at the preview event I attended a lot of people were quite sold on the blue.

Specs and camera: double lens not triple, but powerful elsewhere

As with the other phones in the S25 series, the phone is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy. This phone doesn’t have the camera capabilities of the S25 Ultra, not least because there’s not enough room to fit the triple cam hardware in.

Instead, you get a dual lens setup, with a 200MP main camera (with an 18% slimmer module) and a 12MP ultrawide. We’ll have to wait for a full review to see how this performs as I couldn’t get a proper sense of it in such a short period of time. In addition to 256 or 512GB of storage, there’s 12GB of LPDDR5X memory and it supports Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4. Bang up to date.

Battery life: proof’s in the pudding

So let’s get to those key questions I posed before. The battery has a capacity of 3900mAh. There’s no getting away from the fact that form has been prioritied over function here.

Samsung claims the phone will cope with 24 hours of video playback, but that’s a bit of a slack way of describing how long it will actually last.

The proof will be when I come to actually review it, but I’d imagine it will achieve a full awake day and no more. Because none of us are just watching video; we’ve got social apps, work emails and 56 WhatsApp or Messenger groups going on.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge verdict

So back to our other key question – just who is the Galaxy S25 for? From my point of view, it’s someone who’s not price-sensitive (obviously) who doesn’t want a larger and heavier S25 Ultra that weighs 60g or so more. But the comparison with the S25+ is much more challenging.

The S25 Edge may weigh 27g less and be 1.5mm thinner, but it’s also £100 more (and indeed, you can get the S25+ cheaper than that at the moment). You have to be pretty nuts to go for the Edge unless the price decreases markedly. It might be a feat of miniturisation, but there’s just no justification for it as things stand.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge tech specs