Galaxy S9 vs. Galaxy S9+: Which Samsung Smartphone Is Right for You?

Samsung will officially start retail sales of its Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ smartphones. Media reports say that buyers who placed preorders for the phones earlier in March with their mobile carriers started receiving them on March 13. The basic design of these handsets, which were introduced Feb. 26 at Mobile World Congress, is mostly unchanged from last year’s models. However, they come with faster processors, improved cameras, and new security features. Although the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ are extremely similar, they have some important differences customers will want to consider when decided which one to buy.  Read on to learn more about these handsets to determine which model is the best choice.

At first glance, the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ might appear to be identical. They both come with curved screens and thin bezels and offer a fingerprint sensor on the back in lieu of a physical home button on the front. However, the Galaxy S9, which has a slightly smaller screen, is both thinner and narrower than the Galaxy S9+. Samsung’s Galaxy S9 also has a single rear camera compared to a dual-lens array in the Galaxy S9+. Road warriors should know that at 163 grams, the Galaxy S9 is notably lighter than the 189-gram Galaxy S9+.

Samsung’s Galaxy S9 ships with a 5.8-inch display featuring a quad-HD+ resolution of 2,960-by-1,440 pixels. The OLED screen bundles 570 pixels per inch, which means its image resolution will be outstanding. The Galaxy S9+’s screen measures 6.2 inches and has the same 2,960-by-1,440-pixel resolution. However, that handset comes with 529 pixels per inch.

Both the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ have an 8-megapixel front-facing camera sensor that’s designed to take selfies and portraits. On the back, users will find a single-lens camera in the Galaxy S9, featuring a 12-megapixel sensor and 77-degree field of view for wide shots. The Galaxy S9+ has the same 12-megapixel sensor, but adds a telephoto camera to complete its dual-lens array. The telephoto camera offers digital zoom up to 10 times so users can capture images from afar.

Both Samsung handsets are equipped with Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 845 processor, which not only delivers speedier performance, but also improved battery efficiency.

Additional RAM might allow the Galaxy S9+ to deliver better overall performance than the Galaxy S9. The S9 comes with 6GB of onboard RAM, topping the 4GB of memory built into the Galaxy S9. Both handsets, however, come with 64GB of storage.

Both the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ should deliver impressive battery performance, but the Galaxy S9 offers a 3,000mAh battery pack that promises talk time of up to 22 hours on a single charge. However, the Galaxy S9+ has a 3,500mAh battery pack that can deliver up to 25 hours of talk time. On music playback, the Galaxy S9+ can last for 94 hours before needing a recharge. The Galaxy S9 can last 80 hours on a single charge.

Samsung is touting a variety of additional features in its new smartphones, including an improved Bixby virtual personal assistant and an augmented reality emoji feature for sending 3D cartoon renderings as messages to friends and family. Those features are available in both Samsung smartphone models. So far, there’s no indication that one handset model will operate those apps better than the other.

Samsung’s two new handsets are both running on Android Oreo. Users will also find that Samsung’s own user interface run on both model along with a variety of apps developed by the company, including Samsung Pay and Bixby. But users will also find plenty of Samsung bloatware, such as additional messaging, contact, management and calculator apps (among many others) that sit alongside standard Android programs.

The Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ come with several biometric security features. On the rear, users will find a physical fingerprint sensor. On the front, Samsung has once again bundled a face scanner and iris scanner. A new featured called Intelligent Scan combines the smartphone’s facial recognition and iris scanner to identify a person and unlock the device. Samsung says this feature, which is available in both smartphones, delivers stronger security than using either a face scanner or iris scanner separately.

For some, price might be the deciding factor between Samsung’s smartphones. For budget conscious buyers, Samsung’s unlocked Galaxy S9 might be the best selection with its $720 price tag. An unlocked Galaxy S9+ will cost $840. The smartphones are available for all four major U.S. carrier networks, however, and those companies offer monthly payment plans to defray the cost over a one- or two-year period.