Samsung has unveiled its next-generation Galaxy S5 flagship handset at the Mobile World Congress trade show on Monday, and to little surprise, the phone will feature a fingerprint sensor.
Samsung’s response to Apple’s Touch ID also sports a fingerprint scanner under the home button, allowing users to unlock their handset and access private data stored on the phone. Samsung has also partnered with PayPal to enable mobile payments with its fingerprint scanner.
Samsung fingerprint reading technology requires the user to make a “swiping motion” with their finger for the sensor to read a print, unlike Apple’s Touch ID, that simply requires a stationary finger press against the Home button.
The handset sports a “perforated” polycarbonate back exterior, and has a 5.1-inch display with a resolution of 1,920 by 1,080 pixels. The whole shebang is powered by a 2.5-gigahertz quad-core processor and 2GB of RAM. The handset is also water and dust resistant, and runs Android “KitKat” (4.4.2).
The phone also includes a 16-megapixel shooter that Samsung claims has the world’s fastest autofocus speed, focusing in up to 0.3 seconds.
The Galaxy S5 will also include a personal fitness tracker to aid users in monitoring and managing their behavior, in a manner similar to the way the M7 coprocessor found in Apple’s iPhone 5S does. (Imagine that!) Samsung also includes apps that can record diet and exercise records, and also includes a built-in heart rate monitor to measure a user’s pulse.
The heart rate monitor is located on the device’s rear panel, next to the camera flash. Users will be required to place their finger on the sensor to measure their pulse rate.
Also in the health related arena, Samsung announced a separate wearable device called the “Gear Fit,” which is a smaller wrist-worn accessory that will connect with Samsung Galaxy devices.
The Galaxy S5 is set to debut around the world in April.
