The Galaxy S24 lineup consists of the S24, Plus, and the Ultra model. However, the Plus model always didn’t have enough hardware upgrades to justify a 200$ jump in price.
Apple only charges 100$ extra for the Plus, and Samsung charges 200$ for the same notable hardware upgrades. Bigger battery and a bigger screen.
With next year’s models, things might change. Many credible leaks point to two new additions to the lineup. An iPhone 17 Air slim model might join the base, Plus, and the Pros. It doesn’t make too much sense, as it overlaps the Plus model in many ways, and a price bump from that makes it too close to the Pros.
We have to wait and find out how Apple is planning to manage the pricing of all the models. Spacing out five models seems difficult and isn’t exactly necessary either.
Besides, the world has been moving towards thicker phones in general. People want better photos, bigger batteries, and fast charging. This means thicker camera modules. Larger batteries will naturally increase the thickness of the phone.
As we’ve learned, it’s not worth sacrificing practical smartphone aspects for the sake of a thin appearance. It’s obvious with multiple slim devices having horrible durability, like Apple’s own iPad Pro or their old iPhone 6 and 6 Plus.
Samsung also has its own run-ins with QC. As per South Korean leaker yeux1122 via Jukanlosreve, the S25 Slim and iPhone Air are not even that thin in actual size. Both companies tried to use a new substrate to increase the battery size since a slim phone would severely compromise battery life.
Unfortunately, these attempts did not succeed. Both companies couldn’t do it in time, and they’ll instead compromise on aspects like battery life to release these models. To make the phones still have a reasonable battery life, they’ll make the phones way thicker than the initial plans. As per the leaks, the S25 Slim will not even have a lot of units available for sale.
As per Apple’s initial plans, the iPhone 17 Air was supposed to have a 6mm thickness. But if it’s just a sliver of a millimeter thinner than base model iPhones, paying more for that doesn’t really make sense.
Samsung is taking a more practical approach since leaks speculate it’ll have a periscope camera and also a 200MP main sensor, which are notable upgrades from the Plus. At this point, it’s better to remove the Plus entirely and replace it with the Slim.
