I'm in love! October 4, 2012

Reviewer:  C. Smith "Briarpatch"  (Jackson, Mississippi) -

I have been waiting for this phone for over a year. Even when the Galaxy II came out, I knew there would be the III with Ice Cream Sandwich, and had decided to wait for it. My first smartphone was the Galaxy Captivate for AT&T, so I have been in the Samsung camp since the beginning and have no regrets. Even though I had "issues" after the second OTA firmware update to my Captivate, and was constantly having to reboot, etc., the phone still performed so well that I never doubted Samsung would come through with the perfect phone. I am also a firm Android person since the beginning. So don't ask me to compare it to the iPhone anything, because I just don't know. I do know that iPhone doesn't have SWYPE, still, so that is plenty enough to keep me with Android if there was nothing else.

Anyway, the new phone is stupendous! Everything I ever wanted is here, at my finger tips. The size of the phone was never an issue for me. I thought it might seem awkward at first after reading a lot of information about it. But truly, it always seemed to be exactly the right size to me. I haven't even had this phone two full days yet, and already it is completely useful to me. How's that for customer friendly.

The size of the screen is going to make a difference for a lot of people who might not have bothered with reading Kindle books, watching TV or movies, reading their email, Facebook, etc. on a cell phone. Now, with this wonderful phone, you truly have a mini computer in your pocket. I like tablets too, but they don't fit in my purse so well, and this does. Portability, plus able to make phone calls. What more could you want?

Check out my review for the Androidified CruzerLite TPU Case for Samsung Galaxy S III - Translucent Teal case for this phone. I think this is the perfect case for this phone.

Easily the Best Smartphone Available August 3, 2012

Reviewer:  Oakleaf 

First off I'd like to say that this is my first smartphone, but all my friends have smartphones, and I have played around with them. I have tried out the Galaxy Nexus, Razr Maxx, Droid Bionic, HTC One X, and the iPhone 4s.

The S3 is amazing. The display makes your jaw drop. The battery easily lasts through a ten hour day. The screen is super responsive. The hardware and software rock.

Pros-

-ICS (Jelly Bean coming soon)
-Battery
-Display
-Camera
-Design (nice and thin, but still sturdy)
-Large screen (could be a con)
-Hardware (duel core, 2 gbs of ram)

Cons-

-Touchwiz interface can be annoying at times.
-Physical buttons (not a con for everyone, but ICS was meant to get away from physical buttons)
-Default Keyboard... Install a third party keyboard ASAP. Go Keyboard is a good free one, or Switftkey 3 is a great paid one.
-S-Voice. It's not a big deal for me. Remember that Jelly Bean will come with a better voice assistant.

Overall, I am very happy about this phone. It will surely stay as a top phone for the next couple years.

Best smartphone September 30, 2012

Reviewer:  Amazon Reviewer29 

I am really glad I got this phone. At the moment this is the best smartphone on the market. In my opinion this phone is better than its competing iPhone 5 or HTC one x. The HTC one x and iphone 5 do not offer a removable battery or upgrade memory card like this one does. The HTC one x is also much more bulkier, heavier and doesn't fit as good in the hand as this phone does. The s3 also has 2gb of ram which the HTC one x and iPhone 5 have only 1gb of ram. I tried the s2 when it first came out last year and there were a few things I just didn't like about it. Samsung has improved a lot with hardware and software this time with the s3. The s3 has a led notification light which the previous s2 never had. The iPhone 5 also doesn't have the led notifications. The s3 is very light, thin and fits very nicely in the hand. There have been many improvements to the touch wiz interface to make it more user friendly and very similar to HTC's sense interface. The phone part works great. Whether making calls using the ear piece, speaker phone or headset the sound is loud and clear. The audio quality for music, videos and games is also very good quality and loud for the speaker or headphones. I especially liked using the included ear phones for making calls or listening to music. They remind me of apples older earbuds not the newer ear pods as I have not tried them. The Samsung earphones have lots of bass, good sound isolation and have a built in remote with volume, play, pause and next/previous track controls. Battery life is good for a phone this size and this advanced. The battery is larger than both the HTC one x and the iPhone 5. I can get about 11 hours of continuous talk time. If I'm on wifi with light to medium use I can get about 24 hours. If I'm on LTE I can get about 12-16 hours of light to medium use. The screen on this phone is beautiful it's very vibrant and great to use. I do find the screen to be not as bright as my previous phone (HTC sensation). I especially notice this on a very bright sunny day outside. The screen is still readable just not as bright as it used to be.
I have experienced some wifi issues with the phone. I'm on my second phone which has the same issue. Wifi is not as stable, disconnects once in a while and not as fast, the signal also seems to vary without me moving the phone. I hope this issue is fixed With the upcoming jelly bean update. Others on xda forums have also reported similar wifi issues. I also miss some of the sense features from my HTC sensation. Features like missed call preview in the lock screen, text message preview in the lock screen and the calendar agenda widget. I also preferred the stock email app on the HTC. I don't like the touch wiz email stock app. It doesn't load emails in the HTML format automatically. When viewing an email you have scroll to the bottom and then click on load more to get in HTML format. Other than a few touch wiz interface features the phone is a pleasure to use and own. I plan on rooting my phone soon once jelly bean is officially released and install the cm10 custom rom. I will update review once I have updated to jellybean and rooted my phone. This phone is loaded with so many more features than any of the other smartphones on the market right now. It's also cheaper than the iPhone 5 and same price as the HTC one x.

Great phone! Dwarfs the iPhone. March 15, 2013

Reviewer:  J. Culver "JCulver"  (Waco, TX USA) -

I upgraded from the Galaxy S1 to the Galaxy S3 recently. Much improved; both touch screen and operating system.
I love the Android OS. The extra screen real estate makes an enormous difference in readability, but still fits in all my pockets. I'll keep this phone for as long as I can. It does everything I need and much more.

My only complaint is that multitasking (like looking up a phone number during a call) is not very intuitive .

Love how it works... Hate the build quality February 23, 2013

Reviewer:  R. Allen "Uptown's own"  (New York N.Y.) -

Everyone by now know how great a phone this is when it comes to functionality... But I must say that I'm not impressed with its the build quality. It is cheap .... I have had this phone for a month and already it is showing wear and tear on the upper right side corner ( where I take the case off) because it is made primarily of plastic or polycarbonate as they say.. It just doesn't hold up very well which is a shame because I do like this phone but for the money I do think the materials that it is made out of should be much better in quality. My advice is to buy a good cover and never take it off . By the way my phone is from tmobile but I couldn't find it on amazon to write a review

Slim and light November 25, 2012

Reviewer:  tony  (atlanta, ga) -

My experienced with this phone has nothing been solid. It operate very fluid and fast. I like the fact that I have more user control over the operating system and not limited to what I can do. I downloaded many hi-def games from its play store and when I play them the graphics are so intense and clear. The text is also very clear to read and there is no blur text whatsoever. Reminds me of my how clear my previous iphone 4 screen resolution was though this phone operate so much faster than it. S voice is cool but can use a better sexier voice. S voice sounds like she is about to die in my opinion. This phone is overall excellent and has been very useful.

Awesome Phone! November 12, 2012

Reviewer:  KDI 

Over the past few cellular contracts I moved from an iPhone 3g to a Samsung Captivate and now to a Samsung Galaxy S3 and wow the progression for me has been great. I have had my S3 for 4 months now and can't find anything wrong with it at all. This phone has really fast response when operating applications and web surfing. The camera is outstanding for a cell phone. I use the camera's burst mode all the time and then select the best photos. I think the shutter speed could be faster because I do get blurry photos sometimes when trying to take pictures of moving subjects. But with burst mode I can usually find a good one to keep. I added a 32 Gig expandable memory card to the phone and I have about a thousand songs stored on it with tons of room to spare. I use the phone to bluetooth into a wireless speaker system to play songs from the memory card and it works great. The operating system allows for a great means to customize lock screens and wallpapers as well as widgets. I got rid of my bedside clock because the clock and alarm/wake features on the phone are perfect. It will wake you up with a soft sound first, then transition into your alarm sounds. This phone is awesome. With moderate use through the day my phone will be at about 35% remaining by the end of the day. So far I really like this phone.

<3 In LOVE! Great upgrade from Captivate! <3 November 5, 2012

Reviewer:  M. Holland "maidmarian4"  (Utah, USA) -

Ok, I loved my Captivate, but there were apps I added to make for a better phone usage experience. Well, Samsung must have figured it out, and I didn't have to download as many replacement apps as I did with my Captivate. I did get "Business Calendar" to replace their calendar, but their calendar is actually pretty cool. The camera app is much improved, and so I don't use my paid "Little Camera" app very often. I don't need any folder making apps either. I used to have an app that made noise when the call ended - Samsung has that now! :) I'm sure I'm missing more things, but I'm sure the other reviews will cover more areas to brag about.

I don't like their e-mail app (or google's for that matter!). I also don't like their chat app (I use "Pansi" instead). S Voice could be much better. She doesn't always understand me, or she thinks she does and it's way off and I end up auto calling the wrong person. She has potential though...

LOVE the color... I hated the white as it looked cheap. But, the blueish purplish metallic look .... heck yeah! With a clear TPU case, you can totally enjoy the look.

Hook'em Horns! November 1, 2012

Reviewer:  Hook'em! 

This purchase is a result of my decision not to go backwards in technology. I thought of getting an old bullet style phone to simplify, but after having this phone for 2 weeks, I'd never go back. This makes my life simpler than ever! Work email, personal email, movies, and music (on my 32g sd card) makes this the best tool/toy yet! I encourage you to decide on this phone, because it does so much more than a phone. I always said the iPad was like a smart phone without the phone. This is like a tablet with a phone! Before purchase, the size was a concern, but that has been proven moot. I bought a slim case and it fits neatly into my pocket and feels very comfortable in hand.

Pros:
- Weight
- HD display (amazing)
- Camera/Video are unbelievable
- Device Help App is very helpful
- SD Card Slot makes it expandable to 64g
- Keyboard (quarty, and not on the main display so I can choose if I want a pre-spelled word...love that!)

Cons:
- None!

Nice phone short battery life September 16, 2012

Reviewer:  RJ60 

I have had the Galaxy S III for three weeks now. It is a beautiful device and runs all the features very well. After setting up my Gmail and Facebook the battery was dead in 4 to 5 hours with very little phone use. To get the "cell standby" battery usage below 70% to 80% I have had to disable all of the features I would like to use on the phone. Including all sync, wifi,and all apps. There may be an Android upgrade coming to correct this but no guarantee that it will be available for my G3 version from AT&T.

Great phone August 27, 2012

Reviewer:  EddieAmazon 

Running CyanogenMod 9 AOKP, I'm able to go more than a day without recharging. I'm overclocked to 2.1ghz. That combined with 2GB RAM, there is nothing this phone can't do.

Bad chice on ATT carrier December 24, 2012

Reviewer:  Prasad Kodali 

Had several issues with the phone and recent minor update released by ATT made it worse. Dropped calls, deleted contacts, often freezes, slow response....... And this is happening only with ATT carrier and their crapware, just check the number of people complaining. I called ATT and the response was; we know the software issues but you are stuck with it. I paid to break the contract and moved on, this after being a 8 year customer with ATT.

Great phone with one design flaw February 21, 2013

Reviewer:  MCTC lover  (Simi Valley, California) -

I won't leave a long detailed review - plenty of others have done that. I'm really enjoying the upgrade from my Incredible 2. However there is a design flaw in this phone that's pretty annoying. The volume button and the power button are directly across from each other, on opposite sides of the phone. Whenever I want to change the volume, I accidentally turn the phone off because my hand naturally holds the phone at the same spot on both sides. And if I'm looking to turn off the phone, I frequently hit the volume first. Having both on the same side or one on top and the other on a side would fix this issue.

This issue aside, I love the camera (even though I had heard it was this phone's weak spot), love the voice commands, and haven't had any connectivity issues.

Last, I really miss the HTC homepage widget. I wish someone would create an Android app that does the same thing. Accurate weather that animates the current conditions (love the windshield wiper!) and gives the hi & lo temp plus the timestamp. I miss my windshield wiper on rainy days. Yes, I really am that shallow.

Quite good with serious issues January 6, 2013

Reviewer:  A. H. Klein 

Updated review

I get calls where others don't. The earpiece never disconnects accidentally. It integrates seamlessly with the wireless networks I use at home, cafe and office. It plays music better than my my 'mp3' player both wirelessly (in the car) and over powered bookshelf speakers. Reading news is easy on the high quality screen. Typing is particularly easy making it quite good for note taking (I'm a men's medium). And, of course, it accepts 64gb micro sd cards. However, I have some serious gripes--one that would have prevented me from buying the phone.

It is difficult to navigate within text boxes (form fields?) Some are difficult to view! Using my mail service's web interface, for example, it's practically impossible to compose an email... This is hardly the end of the world, but, it is generally frustrating. Removing the back cover is awkward, and the cover itself seems like it won't last through a lot of on-off. Wish the micro sd slot were just accessible. Why isn't it?

One gripe, in particular, that I guess I'd pushed out of mind is: Why must I keep a Yahoo! bookmark, and why must bookmarks that I cannot delete be kept at the top of the screen--the most valuable real estate on the list? On a device of this caliber ($200 with a plan at time of purchase) it's especially obnoxious. I don't buy Apple products because of fascist bullcrap just like this... And if there is any one issue that will engender my disloyalty, it is overly aggressive advertising within services and applications for which I pay high prices.

P.S. Yahoo!, you've lost pageviews already as I've stopped visiting your news page altogether.

Can't really complain about anything. July 5, 2012

Reviewer:  johnny "rocketman" 

I have been using the phone for a couple of weeks. I have the pebble blue version with 16 gb of built in memory. The finish looks great, but when you pop of the back you can see it is just a cheap piece of plastic. The back cover comes off easily and the battery is easily accessible. Everything on the phone is plastic and all the edges are rounded. I am not sure how you could dock this into anything since there are no flat edges like the iphone 4. The buttons on the sides work well but I am constantly pressing them by accident. I recently installed a bumper case so this doesn't happen anymore. The external speakers (one on front and one on back) have good power, but since the one on the back faces away from you its not the best place to put it. The screen is nice and big, but the phone is very thin and light. I have no problem fitting it in my pocket. All of the software seems to run fast on it. Youtube videos are flawless, and when you rotate the phone into landscape the video takes you the whole screen. I have also copied a WMV video from my desktop and that also played well. There is an LED light on the front that lights up when you get a voice message, email or text and I like that feature a lot. The headphones that come with it are good. I have big ears and it still seals well. There are buttons on the cord that allow you to change the volume and I think there is also a built in mic but a haven't tried to use it yet. I havent' used the camera so I can't say how good it is. Call quality is very good. Battery life seems ok if you only turn on the LTE when you need it. If you leave LTE on all day it chews up the battery. It does take a few hours to charge the battery so I try not to let the battery drain all the way down.

dont belive the lies!! GS3 phone of the year July 7, 2012

Reviewer:  Oscar Anaya "-oscar"  (usa) -

This is my 3rd galaxy phone and all i can say is...WOW!! i love this phone its big and powerfull has so much custom options that you can be on it for days! I work for sales and this phone is one of the best i seen in a while yes it feels light and people may even say cheap. but thats not true at all it does have gorilla glass. it is smooth.. ( buy a case anyway ur on amazon ) this phone has a lot of what the gs2 wish it had. best phone i think for the year better then iphone i say so myself. (had i phone for a year) and was not happy with what i had at the moment

contracts?? December 10, 2012

Reviewer:  mint deer 

Is this phone a non contract phone. I realize its for at&t.but I'm looking into unlnocking it and I want to know before before I buy thanks

loving this phone July 9, 2012

Reviewer:  Brandon A. Newman "blur"  (usa) -

i preordered this phone and have had it for a few weeks. im not going to go into huge detail but i came from a iphone4 which was a great phone but this galaxy is far more advanced than my iphone. camera is great. screen is just amazing not dull as some say. front camera is good best ive seen so far though im sure there are better out there. ive seen some reviews saying the phone feels cheap i didn't really spend too much time feeling for that as i put a case on it and it feels like any other phone with a case. this phone is a lightning fast i think it will be one of the fastest for a while. if your a non bias tech lover this you'll most likely love this phone as i do.

The Hype Machine Got This One Wrong July 22, 2012

Reviewer:  M. Allshouse  (Hershey, PA USA) -

The Galaxy S III seems to be the new "Jesus phone." It received such pre-release hype that some tech reviewers, even after noting the defects in the device, heaped upon it rave reviews. In reality, the S III has enough problems that it almost single-handedly lends credence to those inane Microsoft commercials claiming that Android phones are beta devices. While it seems likely that Samsung could fix a lot of these problems with a good software upgrade; there is no guarantee that this will happen, given their propensity for denying the existence of problems and moving slowly (if at all) to fix them.

Let's start with the screen. While the screen is large, it's also very dim. Apparently Samsung felt the best way to increase battery power on this 4.8 inch phone was to cut the brightness by about half that of other phones. And, I'm not talking about the semi-dark default brightness that can be adjusted by the user, nor am I talking about the silly separate brightness setting assigned to the browser. No, I'm talking about the full on brightness level that is nearly impossible to view outdoors in medium daylight. I guess Samsung figures users won't run the battery down too fast if they can't see the phone's screen. Frankly, I'd rather be able to view the phone comfortably and carry an extra battery in my pocket.

Another feature hobbled by Samsung's desperate attempt to conserve battery life is Wifi. Even in the same room with my router, I found the Wifi signal weak and intermittent. After a bit of research on the issue, I learned that Samsung had applied a "power saver" setting to the Wifi, one that can only be accessed and turned off by dialing a special MMI code on the dialer. Adding insult to injury, this fix has to be re-applied after every reboot of the phone.

The S III's camera has been widely touted by the tech media, and it's a nice camera. Still photos look about as good as you can expect for a mobile phone camera. However, the video camera's auto focus seems overworked when shooting objects in motion. This causes intermittent blurring to occur in video shot with the phone, almost like the camera is constantly zooming in and out. To their credit, Engadget briefly mentioned this in their review. Everyone else seems to have either failed to actually test the video camera or ignored the issue.

Another camera-related feature that fails miserably is Smart Stay. The camera is supposed to use facial recognition to determine if you are still looking at the phone. If you are, it is supposed to delay dimming the screen, and then putting the device into sleep mode, for as long as you are looking at it. The feature fails to work about 90% of the time. Again, this may be something that can be improved with a software update. Unfortunately, the person I talked to at Samsung refused to acknowledge the issue in spite of it being widely reported by users and reviewers.

Finally, there's S-Voice, Samsung's answer to Apple's Siri. S-Voice is just plain dumb. I asked S-Voice, "What is the square root of nine." It acknowledged that it understood the question, and then provided me with the square root of four. I repeated the question. S-Voice again displayed a correct understanding of the question and gave the same wrong answer. Forget the fact that S-Voice's voice recognition often fails to understand users; even when it does, it gets the answers wrong.

Yes, the Galaxy S III has a large and attractive screen. Yes, it has a reasonably powerful processor. And yes, Samsung has backed off enough from Touch Wiz that it doesn't completely ruin the user experience of the phone. However, there are way too many hardware shortcomings and half-baked software features to call this a great phone. The Galaxy S III does not live up to the pre-release hype and you should carefully consider if it is worth the monetary investment and two-year commitment that AT&T and other carriers require.

Finally interesting phone!!! July 4, 2012

Reviewer:  K. Lee  (Gaithersburg, MD United States) -

I used the original Galaxy S, but after few months of use, I handed it down to my brother, and decided to go with iPhone 4 because there were lots of cool accessories and apps only available for iphone. Novelty of iPhone 4 wore off just after few months after seeing that similar apps finally arrived for Android phones. iPhone 4 quickly became boring and craving for constantly changing Android OS and more customizable features available.

After playing with boring iPhone until Galaxy S3 arrived, I now feel that this is what smartphone should be. It's so amazing how this machine changed my life. Not a big fan of using camera, but I love to take picture with this GS3. Internet is super fast. I tether internet through PDAnet app with my laptop, WOW, internet speed is amazing on 4G LTE. Plastic cover feels a little cheap, but much better than non-removable cover of iPhone. I have several extra batteries, they last long time on the go. I always on the go with client to client with lots of phone calls, with 2 extra batteries, it lasts two full days of heavy calls, internet, photo, apps, etc. Amazing battery life on this GS3 is very hard to beat.

Screen is amazingly beautiful. I just wonder how below reviewer rated so low on this phone. They are maybe an employee of one of the competitors to attempt to destroy sales. I think as long as people see the full potential of this phone, people will love this phone.

After boring iphone experience, I don't believe that I will go back to iphone ever. Also, I was told that GS3 will be upgraded to a new Android OS later this year. COOL!!! Android OS is much more interesting than boring apple OS. This is my humble opinion.