Report: The Galaxy S7 edge is pretty cool but TouchWiz still stutters

By Dan Isacsson Published March 8, 2016

In an early report from XDA Developers, it appears that Samsung still hasn’t figured out how to keep their OS lag-free for the Galaxy S7 edge. But basic issues aside, it seems to perform according to flagship expectations. It outdid the competition overall, and the virtual reality (VR) apps they tested ran without any noticeable stuttering. It also doesn’t seem to suffer from annoying heating issues. Considering the Gear VR is included with pretty much every pre-order of the Galaxy S7 edge, that’s probably a good thing.

Samsung’s latest offering comes equipped with this year’s Qualcomm flagship processor, the Snapdragon 820. XDA put the Galaxy S7 edge up against four other phones: The iPhone 6S Plus with an Apple A9 processor, Samsung’s own Galaxy Note 5 with an in-house Exynos 7420, the Motorola Moto X Pure sporting a Snapdragon 808, and a Nexus 6P equipped with last year’s Snapdragon 810.

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As previously mentioned, the Snapdragon 820 performed very well. Performance has improved considerably from last year’s models, and the CPU throttling plaguing the Snapdragon 810 seems to have been balanced out by Qualcomm. But alas, it wasn’t flawless. As we’ve come to expect from most of Samsung’s phones, regardless of what preliminary performance charts tell us, the report mentions both lag and stutter in the TouchWiz interface. Then there’s frame skipping in the Play Store, but that’s a standard issue with Samsung’s phones and nothing to get too surprised by. Input lockups were also noticed.

galaxy s7 edge heat comparison — In the CPU test the Galaxy S7 edge (second from the left) topped out at 84°F. XDA Developers

XDA Developers

But all of these details come from an early report from one source and Samsung’s phones don’t always perform the same way for everyone. There are also no details on whether or not the Galaxy S7 edge differs in performance from the Galaxy S7. Samsung has a long history of performance issues with their TouchWiz interface and we’ll likely have to wait a bit longer before they finally nail it down.

The Galaxy S7 edge and Galaxy S7 will arrive March 8 for those who pre-order, whule other buyers will be able to purchase the phone March 11. Keep your eyes locked to Digital Trends for our upcoming reviews of the Galaxy S7 edge and Galaxy S7.

Former Contributor

Being a gamer since the age of three, Dan took an interest in mobile gaming back in 2009. Since then he's been digging ever…

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