Telstra, Optus, Vodafone, Virgin reveal Samsung Galaxy S4 pricing
At the Sydney Opera House on Tuesday night, Samsung announced that the new Samsung Galaxy S4 will go on sale in Australia on Saturday, April 27. Telstra, Optus, Vodafone, and Virgin have all confirmed that they will offer the new 4G phone.
The new Android-based phone with the Quad-core 1.9GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon Series 600 processor can be bought outright at a RRP of AU$899, but Telstra will sell it to you outright for AU$816.
Telstra is offering the Galaxy S4 to both business and retail customers for AU$87 per month on a 24-month plan (including handset repayment) with 1.5GB of data per month, $800 worth of standard national calls and MMS, as well as unlimited SMS within Australia.
Optus will offer the phone on the AU$67 per month plan (including handset repayment) for 24 months, with 1.5GB of data per month, $600 worth of calls, unlimited SMS, and unlimited calls to other Optus mobile numbers.
Vodafone's plan comes in at $65 per month over 24 months (including handset repayment) with 1.5GB of data, $700 worth of calls, unlimited national and international texts, and unlimited calls to other Vodafone and 3 Mobile customers. Those who take up the plan will get an additional 1GB of data per month for the first 12 months, meaning they will effectively have 2.5GB of data per month to use.
Optus subsidiary Virgin Mobile slightly edged out Vodafone's deal, offering the device to existing Virgin customers for AU$61 per month (including handset repayment) or AU$66 per month for new customers (including handset repayment). Virgin customers get 3GB of data to use per month, $700 worth of calls, unlimited SMS, and free calls between Virgin mobile numbers.
Telstra, Optus, and Virgin customers buying the Galaxy S4 will immediately have access to 4G services from Saturday, but Vodafone customers will have to wait until the company switches on its 4G network in June in Sydney, Perth, Melbourne, Adelaide, Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Newcastle, and Wollongong.
Vodafone customers will potentially have access to much faster 4G services, however, because Vodafone will use its entire 20MHz contiguous allocation of spectrum in the 1800MHz band for 4G, whereas Telstra and Optus currently only use 10MHz for their 4G services, with the exception of Perth, where Telstra has 20MHz.