18 December 2017


Rumor: Galaxy S9 to pack a 3,200 mAh battery

Abhijeet Mishra

Reading time: 2 minutes

we have heard rumors of samsung bringing its galaxy s flagships to market ahead of its regular schedule quite a few times before, but those rumors have never panned out. now, korean publication the bell, which had earlier reported that development on the galaxy s9 had begun ahead of schedule under the codename project star, is saying that samsung's next flagship could be launched in january. the bell believes the early galaxy s9 launch can be chalked up to the fact that a device is usually assembled and launched two to three months after its display panels are shipped to samsung, which, for the s9, is set to happen in november. quicker shipment of a phone's parts doesn't necessarily mean samsung will unveil the galaxy s9 in january. the company could be planning on putting a couple of months of extra work on its next flagship, perhaps to make the rumored move to slp technology, which should theoretically allow the company to fit in a larger battery inside the phone. but the bell thinks samsung is accelerating the launch to combat sales of the iphone 8, and that does make sense. the iphone 8 will have a bezel-less display like the galaxy s8, and the resultant increase in consumer demand for the upcoming iphone could eat into samsung's sales of the galaxy note 8. the company also did start launching galaxy note flagships a month earlier with the galaxy note 5, and we might just see the same happen to the galaxy s lineup with the s9. the rumor mill has only just begun churning out information about the galaxy s9, and it's too early to take anything seriously. not a lot is known about the handset at this point; a rumor suggested the s9 could have a modular design, and obvious reports that the phone will feature an infinity display and qualcomm's snapdragon 845 soc are also floating around.
Phone
In an ideal world, we'd see smartphone manufacturers increasing the battery size on their flagships each year. That doesn't happen, and while batteries do sometimes get bigger on newer flagships compared to their predecessors, it's not something that happens as often as we'd like. Samsung's been guilty of it a few times: The Galaxy S8+ has a smaller battery than the Galaxy S7 edge, and the difference in battery capacity is even higher between the Galaxy Note 8 and the ill-fated Galaxy Note 7. The Galaxy S6, of course, took the cake back in 2015 with its abysmal 2,550 mAh battery, a substantial 350 mAh less than the Galaxy S5.

A 3,200 mAh battery for the Galaxy S9?

There's no telling how the Galaxy S9 will compare to the Galaxy S8, although recently revealed dimensions of the device suggest the phone will be thicker and, therefore, technically have more space for a larger battery. We've already speculated as much, and today, a new leak says the Galaxy S9 indeed has higher battery capacity than the S8. The information reportedly comes from someone in possession of a test unit, but we're not entirely sure, as the source is in Chinese and Google doesn't do a great job of translating things to a form of English that would be easy to make sense of. The same source also suggests the S9 will support Quick Charge 3.0, which, frankly, would not impress us considering how it should have arrived on Samsung devices a long time ago.

Rumor: Galaxy S9 to pack a 3,200 mAh battery

Should the Galaxy S9 have a 3,200 mAh battery, one would hope the courtesy of a larger battery (compared to the S8+) would be extended to the Plus-sized model as well. It's possible it might not happen, however, and Samsung could just be making sure the smaller of its flagships stop being as limited as they are right now in terms of battery endurance. Nothing's certain, of course, so we'll just have to wait and see how much of this particular rumor is based on fact.

What do you think?