My hopes for the Galaxy S25 Edge just crashed: this is shaping up to be a monumental failure

I have to admit: covering the smartphone industry for 15 years makes me a bit cynical about innovation, especially in the past few years when new ideas are hard to come by. But the moment I heard about the trend of thin phones, I was genuinely excited.

And while most camera innovation these days is coming from Chinese phones like Xiaomi and Vivo (very hard to buy in Western countries), the thin phone trend is led by none other than Samsung and Apple. So far, so good.

Samsung was the first to officially reveal its plans, teasing the Galaxy S25 Edge in January at Unpacked, while Apple has chosen to stay secretive about its plans for an “iPhone 17 Air”. Thankfully, reputable leakers including Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman have revealed lots of details about the Air phone, and we now know with a good amount of certainty that it is coming in September, along with the other more familiar iPhone 17 models.

I was super excited about the Galaxy S25 Edge until…

I was particularly excited about the Galaxy S25 Edge, the first super-thin phone to hit the market.

The fact that you could have a device roughly the size of a Galaxy S25 Plus but much thinner and much lighter was enough for me not to care too much about the rest.

Of course, I was hoping it would have a snappy processor and a decent camera, and granted, it will.

But I was not prepared for Samsung to shoot itself in the foot this badly.

The Galaxy S25 Edge costs how much?!

Samsung has not confirmed this yet, but we are hearing from multiple sources that the Galaxy S25 Edge will cost an arm and a leg.

Just today, the Galaxy S25 Edge appeared in online stores in Europe with a price substantially higher than that of a Galaxy S25 Plus.

Italian online store Zanetti has the base 256 GB Galaxy S25 Edge listed for an eye-watering 1,360 euro, which is 200 euro more than the price of a Galaxy S25 Plus with the same amount of storage.

Converting this to US prices, the Galaxy S25 Edge is expected to cost at least $100 more than the base model of the Galaxy S25 Plus, which is priced at $1,000.

If Samsung wanted to kill its best invention in years… that price is the surest and safest way to achieve that!

These leaked prices are double the shock because… they make no sense at all. The Galaxy S25 Edge should cost less than a Galaxy S25 Plus, not more. After all, the S25 Edge will have a smaller battery and fewer cameras, all while keeping the same screen technology and processor.

Apple gets it

And then we have the rumored iPhone 17 Air, coming just a few months after the S25 Edge.

You know the expected price of that one?

$900.

Compared to Apple’s $1,200 Pro Max model, this is a cool $300 cheaper.

And that price actually makes a lot of sense for a phone with fewer cameras, smaller battery and some other limitations related to this form factor such as the higher potential for throttling.

This will also be the year when Apple finally fixes the biggest flaw of its non-Pro iPhones — both the vanilla iPhone 17 and the iPhone 17 Air are getting 120Hz ProMotion, according to leaks.

Add the rumor of the Air being the first iPhone to use a silicon-carbon battery with longer battery life than traditional Li-Ion chemistry, and you get a product that is not as handicapped as it might seem. And most importantly, one that is not handicapped by an insane price.

The T word

All of those contemplations make sense in a stable global economy that is actually functioning.

However, the looming danger of the new tariffs – the big 'T' word – could drastically alter the financial equation for both companies and consumers . And not just for these two phones, but for all tech and all products in general.

Those external factors, however, affect Apple and Samsung in similar ways, so at the end, it is up to the two companies to set the right pricing strategy to make this new trend a success.

And if Samsung indeed prices the S25 Edge as rumors suggest, I am calling it now: it’s dead on arrival.