Samsung Galaxy S5 Release Date Nears; Korean Media Says Upcoming LG G3 Will Be The S5 Killer

Samsung (KRX:005935) is expected to unveil the Galaxy S5, its next-generation flagship smartphone during an unpacked event at the Mobile World Congress on Feb. 24 in Spain, and according to the latest reports from the Korean Media, LG’s (KRX:066570) upcoming smartphone G3, a successor to the existing G2, could be the device to challenge Samsung’s offering.

ZDNet Korea reported on Wednesday that LG could announce the new G3 smartphone in May, and that the handset could be a “Galaxy S5 killer.” According to the report, the LG G3 could feature a 5.5-inch Quad HD display with a resolution of 1440x2560 pixels, while Samsung’s Galaxy S5 is rumored to be released without this feature.

The New York Times reported on Wednesday that unlike current rumors that the Galaxy S5 could sport new technologies such as an eye scanner and the Quad HD display, a person with knowledge of the plans told the publication that neither of these features would make an appearance on the Galaxy S5.

The Times’ report disagreed with some earlier reports about Samsung’s next-generation smartphone that suggested the handset would indeed feature a QHD display.

On Tuesday, Russian blogger Eldar Murtazin took to Twitter and revealed that the Galaxy S5 is likely to feature a 5.25-inch QHD Super AMOLED display with a resolution of 2560×1440 pixels. Murtazin also said that the device could be powered by an Exynos 6 or Snapdragon 805 processor, and have 3 GB of RAM and 32/64 GB of storage capacity.

The phone’s other features could include a 16-megapixel rear camera, a 3.2-megapixel front-facing camera and a large 3,200 mAh battery, according to Murtazin.

Rumors also has it that the Galaxy S5 is expected to run on Android 4.4 KitKat out of the box, and include several Samsung apps, such as S Health and WatchON. In addition to all these, the handset is rumored to feature a swipe fingerprint sensor.

As for the LG G3, some earlier reports said that the device could pack an octa-core chipset and a 16-megapixel rear camera.