Six months into 2015, all the Android flagships have come into the market. After a round of iPhone bashing, the devices are, as usual, battling it out against each other for taking the lion's share of the market. While internal upgrades have been incremental, the focus this year is on build and displays, and of course, cameras too. So, it only makes sense to compare them to each other, let's start with build and design.
If you're a..umm...metal head, there's no shortage of metal here. Both the Samsung Galaxy S6 and HTC One M9+ come with metal frames, while the HTC One M9+ is dual-tone metal. The LG G4 takes a different path with a leather back. If you're looking for the sturdiest flagship, the HTC One M9+ is the one we'd choose.
The LG G4's curved body may be liked by many, but it really is bigger than we like. In comparison, the Galaxy S6 and HTC One M9+ are much easier to handle, while the Sony Xperia Z3's glass back is somewhat slippery and tough to manage.
Overall, in terms of build and design, we would pick the Samsung Galaxy S6, simply because it strikes a balance between screen size and overall size. It's easy to handle and light enough. Sure you have to be careful not to drop it, but with the price companies ask for these phones, we'd be careful any way.
The display can be broken down into parts. The most important of course is the colour reproduction. The Samsung Galaxy S6 and HTC One M9+ (bottom row) are two extremes here, being too warm and too cool respectively. The Xperia Z3+ and LG G4 (top row) though have really nice displays. Of course, the FHD to QHD difference remains, but colours wise, it's very close.
Even in the colour banding tests, it's not very difficult to determine that the LG G4 and Sony Xperia Z3+ are slightly ahead of the competition.
Between the Xperia Z3+ and LG G4 though, we have to go with the LG G4. The phone shous better blacks compared to the Xperia Z3+, which is a little biased towards the white colour.
The same is visible in the white test.
The colour difference though will really depend on person to person. If you're looking at either of these phones seperately. The LG G4 is a tad warmer compared to the Xperia Z3+, so your decision should depend on what you like more.
For us, the LG G4 is the one to go for. It's sharper and is just slightly better in terms of colours. Both the companies seem to have been able to brought their prowess in televisions to mobiles successfully.
Sunlight visibility is a different story though. The HTC One M9+ is by far the worst of the three, while the Samsung Galaxy S6 is without a doubt the best of the lot.
Another area where the HTC One M9+ is really bad is in the viewing angles department. While the Xperia Z3+ is pretty weak as well, the M9+ gets a pinkish hue on the display, from not very acute angles, that ruins images. Both the Galaxy S6 and LG G4 would be the ones to pick here.
That's it folks. We're working on a camera comparison right now, so watch out for this image on the website again.