Samsung Galaxy S5 review roundup: evolution you can skip

First reviews of Samsung's latest flagship Android phone are in – and it isn't exactly five stars across the board

Samsung's Galaxy S5 simply appears to be iterative and could be one to skip. Photograph: Lee Jin-man/AP

Samsung's latest flagship Android smartphone, the Galaxy S5, won't be available to buy until Friday, but the first reviews have arrived – though not with quite the universal praise you might expect. (The Guardian's own review will be published this week.)

Samsung bet big on health tracking, a fingerprint scanner and a big screen with the Galaxy S5 - but the early verdict is that only some of it has paid off.

Here's what people are saying.

TechRadar: Samsung Galaxy S5 review – Samsung goes for evolution over revolution... again.

Gareth Beavis feels the Galaxy S5 is simply an evolution and "doesn't look like a cutting edge smartphone", but ultimately that won't matter when it comes to sales.

Is it good enough in market that's becoming saturated with decent high-end handsets?

The simple answer, from the second you hold it in the hand, is no – because the design simply isn't up to the same level as the likes of Apple and HTC.

Is this phone good enough to keep Samsung fighting with Apple at the top of the sales charts? Yes, but that's mostly through the impressive marketing machine that rolls out in every territory.

CNet: High five: Samsung's best phone gets better

Jessica Dolcourt also considers Samsung's latest efforts iterative, but concludes that isn't necessarily a bad thing if you're a Samsung fan.

With the exception of a few nonessential hardware and software additions - like the fingerprint scanner and novel heart-rate monitor - and a few design tweaks, you're pretty much looking at the same phone Samsung released in 2013. The S5 is more of a Galaxy S4 Plus than it is a slam-the-brakes, next-generation device; it makes everything just a little smoother and faster.

TNW: Samsung Galaxy S5 review: Incremental is the new cool

Owen Williams feels that despite coming across poorly in photos, the dimpled leather-like back of the Galaxy S5 is actually a bonus, or at least a distraction from plastic.

The dimpled back is one of the most contentious points of the phone amongst those online, though, and looks somewhat unattractive in photos. I was won over when I actually held the device for the first time, as opposed to seeing it in photos and renders; it’s attractive and feels nice. By adding these dimples and a rubbery texture to the back, Samsung manages to distract you from the fact that it’s actually just plastic.

AnandTech: Samsung Galaxy S5 review

Anand Lal Shimpi and Joshua Ho were pleased to report that Samsung's stopped cheating in benchmarks, and unsurprisingly the Galaxy S5 is faster than the the previous generation thanks to the newest flagship processor from Qualcomm.

Although Samsung was the first major OEM to be caught cheating in Android benchmarks, it appears to have completely abandoned the practice with the Galaxy S5's shipping software. Not only was I unable to find any evidence of the old cheats, I couldn't find any evidence of HTC's new subtle cheating either. The Galaxy S5 appears to be clean as far as I can tell. Kudos to Samsung on doing the right thing, and I hope all other OEMs take this as a sign to stop the silliness.

The GS5 sees upgrades across the board compared to its predecessor. The underlying silicon is both faster and more power efficient. The battery is larger, and battery life has improved dramatically thanks to silicon and display upgrades. Much like the gains we saw with HTC's M7 to M8 transition, anyone who is on a Snapdragon 600 based device today is going to be incredibly happy upgrading to a Snapdragon 801 platform like the GS5.

Wall St Journal: Samsung Galaxy S5 review: watertight yet still not quite right

Geoffrey Fowler reckons Samsung has made some ground on software, but there's still a long way to go.

The Galaxy S5 is easier to use than the S4. Samsung is playing down a long list of the dubious and confusing services it touted with the previous model, like "air gesture" controls to manipulate the screen without touch. It also no longer pre-installs some space-hogging apps like the Samsung Hub for buying music and video.

A few of the Galaxy S5's software tweaks might make iPhone users envious, such as using keywords to search the ever-growing list of Android settings. My favorite feature, "ultra power savings mode," turns off nonessential services when battery-power is low and you want to preserve juice for phone service.

Samsung still needs to keep simplifying the interface. At the top edge of the screen, a dozen different blinking icons call attention to things you don't always need to know about. And for many basic functions, such as Web browsing, viewing pictures, even taking voice commands, the Galaxy S5 comes preloaded with two different apps. Good grief, does anyone really need the built-in "gallery" and "photo" apps?

Time: Galaxy S5 review: at last, Samsung decides less is more

Harry McCracken agrees.

Much of what’s new in the S5 isn’t all that inventive, but involves stuff that every smartphone owner cares about, such as physical durability, display and camera quality and battery life. And though the overall experience doesn’t reach Apple-esque levels of polish – it melds Google’s Android 4.4 KitKat operating system with a bevy of Samsung’s own customizations – there’s less of the cacophony and clutter which has marred many a past Galaxy device.

Pocket-Lint: Samsung Galaxy S5 review

Chris Hall says the fingerprint scanner works well enough, if you ignore the instructions.

At first we didn't get on with the Galaxy S5's fingerprint scanner because much of the device assumes you're using it two handed. We rarely are. We're standing on a train, queuing with shopping, hanging onto a tantrumming child, ingesting curry, and so on. Rarely do we have the luxury of having two free hands to interact with a phone.

The point is that the Samsung's fingerprint scanner suggests a full straight swipe with a finger or thumb in setup. In reality you'll be gripping your phone and swiping your thumb sideways down it in an attempt to unlock it. Fortunately, that works. The orientation of the unlocking finger doesn't matter, as long as you register that print in the same way then you'll actually unlock the phone.

Telegraph: Samsung Galaxy S5 review: almost brilliant

Matt Warman feels that Samsung's still overreaching, and some things could have been better if scaled back a bit or given more time.

So the S5 is a largely incremental improvement. But if anything it suffers from the scale of its ambition – that fingerprint sensor isn’t quite ready for prime time, and flashy animations on openings folders are slightly slow. The camera’s supposed ability to refocus pictures after they’ve been taken is temperamental, and far surpassed by LG and HTC. All these features would be great if they worked better.

Overall the conclusion at the moment seems to be that Samsung's made some very small steps with the Galaxy S5, adding a few features andcutting others, but that there is still come way to go to beat the highs of the Galaxy S2 and S3.

The GS5 was pushed out a couple of weeks earlier in Samsung's product lifecycle after its predecessor, the Galaxy S4, failed to continue to increase Samsung's sales performance. Whether the Galaxy S5 is enough to counter that slow in sales and growth remains to be seen.