Will The Galaxy S3 Continue To Sell After The Launch of S4?

Samsung has been releasing their high-end Galaxy S smartphone series ever since the time Galaxy S made its debut in June 2010. Apparently, the work undertaken by Samsung before unveiling their newest smartphone, Galaxy S3, in the Galaxy S series took them 18 month. The Galaxy S3 made its presence known on May 3rd 2012 in London and was soon released on 29^th May 2012. Samsung Galaxy S3 created much excitement because of its design, performance and usability. In fact, so much was the hype that 9 million units were pre-ordered under 100+ global carriers contracts. The demand preceded the supply by a great number and Samsung even faced issues related to manufacturing due to the shortage. As of now, more than 50 million units of Samsung Galaxy S3 have been sold.

That is what we must compare the newest release by Samsung, the Galaxy S4. With the introduction of Galaxy S4, the stakes are running high for the Galaxy S3 model. Will it survive in the market or will Samsung’s own mobiles compete against each other? Galaxy S4 comes with latest technological updates in its hardware and software and can beat Galaxy S3 mainly because of that.

Let us focus on the features that will be new to the Galaxy S4. First of all, the Galaxy S4 will be released with a 4.99-inches AMOLED 1080p display at 441 ppi and octa-core SoC (in international models) and will run at 1.6GHz quad-core Cortex-A15 and 1.2GHz quad-core Cortex-A7 and 2GB LPDDR3 RAM. That will make it the most powerful smartphone to be released. The graphic is powered by IT tri-core PowerVR SGX 544 and that will again make it more powerful than Galaxy S3. The OS loaded on the Galaxy S4 will be the latest Jelly Bean 4.2.2, which is also available for Galaxy S3. The camera is 13MP with 1080p Full HD recording in 30fps. The 2MP front camera also has the ability for 1080p HD video recording. We also have a user changeable 2700mAh battery to make the smartphone work with an optional wireless charging.

As we can see, Galaxy S4 is a clear winner over Galaxy S3 but the question is, will that create a negative impact on Galaxy S3? From what I understand, Galaxy S3 will be here to stay for maybe a year or two at the very least. There are major changes in Galaxy S4 that makes it an attractive offer but those who already own Galaxy S3 will probably wait for the next release to update their smartphones. Galaxy S3 performs quite well with latest OS and software updates and is strong enough to last for a year. I think that there will be more purchases of Galaxy S3 by those who probably couldn’t afford to buy Galaxy S3 in the last year, as there will be a price reduction that will reflect after the Galaxy S4 goes for sale in the market. But admittedly that still didn’t stop the pre-order of Galaxy S4 to reach 10 million units breaking Galaxy S3’s 9 million units record.

There is a chance of Galaxy S3 surviving in the market of smartphones where many are from middle class and lower-middle class families who will prefer buying Galaxy S3 to other obsolete models or lower-end smartphones after the price reduces even further. Smartphones are released every year and it may not be possible to buy a new one every time there is a sale of high-end smartphone when you already own one. That will be one reason that Galaxy S3 will stay for more months – the price that we wish we could afford but we cant. When Galaxy S3 was released the model was priced at Rs. 43,000, which created an uproar in India. So, we can safely assume that this high-end Galaxy S4 will not be far from that kind of pricing. Those who are patient will probably wait for the release of next Samsung’s high-end smartphone, Note 3, to buy the Galaxy S4 at reduced price.

Though there are chances for Galaxy S3 to survive, the Galaxy S4 still makes it mark and created an equal if not more of hype in the world. The design has become sleeker and performance has not been equaled by any other smartphone. The bottom-line is that Galaxy S4 is something to watch out for and Galaxy S3 is something to rely on until then. The Samsung Galaxy S3 price in India is currently only Rs. 27311, and that is set to further reduce as Samsung is offering discounts on all mobiles.