Samsung have just announced a brand new smartphone, the Galaxy A8, and it looks like they’re trying to set some new records for their own models, as this one is reportedly the thinnest phone to come out by Samsung so far. It’s also been described as very beautiful by most who’ve seen it, and so far, there is a lot of positive attention focused on the Galaxy A8.
The phone comes with a metal body and is just 0.23 inches thick, with the front nearly lacking any bezels and being dedicated to the screen almost entirely. The phone is also quite light, at about 0.3 pounds overall, and it looks like Samsung have been reevaluating their design direction in general, as it’s been reported that this is the style they’ll be aiming for in their future releases.
However, some are also claiming that the phone is not quite as impressive as the Galaxy S6, the major flagship by the company. It doesn’t have the most impressive specifications compared to the S6, for example. It comes with an 8-core Snapdragon 615 processor, 2 GB of RAM and a display running at a 1080p resolution.
On the rear, there’s a 16 megapixel camera, and a 5 megapixel model on the front for selfies. In addition, it has a 3,050 mAh battery. All in all, the hardware of the Galaxy A8 is not that far off from a flagship, but the device is not as powerful as the S6 either, and it definitely leaves a lot to be desired in people looking for a powerful Android smartphone that can handle anything they want.
Then there’s the availability factor – the phone isn’t made for a worldwide release, and so far the company is only planning to release it in China. There have been some rumors that they are aiming at an international release but are probing the market first – which could make sense, as China is a pretty big market and could give them enough of an indication about the expected performance of the phone.
On the other hand, Chinese buyers do have a bit of an unusual preference for smartphones in some regards, so we’re not sure how this kind of test would be indicative of the phone’s predicted performance around the world in general. Still, Samsung are not a fresh company on the market and they know what they’re doing, so we don’t doubt that they have done their homework before bringing this phone out and they know what to do with their data once they have it.
Meanwhile, Samsung have also been making progress with other entries in their Galaxy line, and it’s been reported that the Galaxy S6 Edge+ will come with a larger screen than the S6 Edge. We don’t know many other specific details about the new phone – and the larger screen size was already implied in its name anyway – but it is starting to look like an interesting release overall, and it’s been attracting a lot of attention.
So far though, it looks like Samsung are trying to explore the different ways in which they can expand their lineup, rather than trying to develop more and more powerful phones, and they are seemingly interested in reaching out to as many different market segments as possible. This, of course, means that they have to release different, varied phones, not just powerful flagships that raise the bar as much as possible.