S7 Edge is a great phone and camera

Albeit rather expensive, the S7 Edge is by far the best phone I have ever used. As a student that is always on the go it makes day to day tasks so much easier than previous handsets I have owned.

As it is a photography forum I will begin by talking about the camera. Before I owned this phone I did not use the camera on my phone all that much as image quality left much to be desired; however I get images from the camera on the S7 that I would expect from a mid-range point and shoot of around £250. Low-light is absolutely superb as is the bokeh when close focusing; for macro shots it does the job brilliantly, minimum focus distance is around 13cm from the 12mp image sensor, which enables plenty of room for cropping. The 'Pro' photo mode is my favourite thing about the camera, finally a full manual mode that doesn't require you to download 3rd party software (as with other devices such as iPhones). I can control all settings that I can with my DSLR except from aperture with ease. The focusing is quick and accurate, even showcasing similar AF tracking from a pro grade DSLR. Image quality is superior to the iPhone 6s as well as the HTC One M10 and enables users to shoot in RAW ready to be edited in Lightroom mobile as I do.

As a smartphone it makes day to day tasks much quicker and easier. Lacking the annoying animations that iPhones have it enables me to get to work 1.2 seconds quicker when unlocking on this when compared to an iPhone 6s or 7, which really mounts up through my working day. 4gb RAM and an 8 core processor enables the S7 to demolish normal tasks and game like an Alienware PC.

A few features that working photographers might like:

• An app that enables you to simply scan business cards and have the contact details saved to the device
• Expandable storage up to 200GB (giving 232GB in total) means that there is plenty of room for large RAW files
• 1440p edge to edge display, which provides much more accurate colours than the iPhone 6s and 7, makes content 'pop' out of the display and gives supreme levels of detail with 534ppi.
• Samsung edge allows instant access to 20 apps of your choice among other widgets.
• Multi-view apps enables the user to overlay an app, such as the phone app, while they navigate through the device, which make multi-tasking much easier than competing smartphones.

Problems with the handset:

• The curved display can make the touch screen clumsy at times, being un-responsive.
• Battery life could be better as I only get around 3-4 hours of screen time a day, which means I need to charge at lunch time or use a battery case.
• I have experienced a small amount of lag when trying to watch YouTube videos and use Microsoft Word at the same time; however this is to be expected I suppose.
• As with all modern phones, expensive yet fragile build materials are used, which with one drop with shatter the phone. While most put a case on their phones it does sort of defeat the purpose of paying for expensive materials.
• While you are able to buy screen protectors for the device, they do not fit properly, you end up with an air pocket in the centre of the display. I would not bother.

Other than the small problems this is the perfect phone for any working photographer despite not showcasing the 50mm equivalent lens that the iPhone 7 plus has. If the Note 7 was not a fire starter then I might say differently, in fact I would have one but as the current phone market sits it is.

Go for Android - "Be together, not the same".