Remember last year, the year before, when we all complained about Samsung churning out phone after unneeded phone? As soon as it started doing that, the quality of its product lineup quickly deteriorated. I’m hoping the Galaxy S6 ge+ isn’t a hint that Samsung’s back to its old tricks again.

Here’s the thing: I genuinely love the Galaxy S6 ge. I use one as my daily driver. But did Samsung really need to churn out another version of it? I was perfectly fine with the idea that the Galaxy Note series would be Samsung’s “phablet” darling, but now there are two different “big” phones to account for. I can see this eventually becoming confusing.

The S6 ge’s bigger brother

The ge+ doesn’t offer much you haven’t seen before. It’s outfitted in the same thin, metal–glass chassis as its counterpart, the Galaxy S6 ge, with similar curved edges on either side of its 5.7-inch screen. Even its antenna stripes speaker are placed in the same spot as its predecessor. 

Inside, has the same processor as the smaller Galaxy S6 ge: the 2.1GHz octa-core Exynos 7420. Only this time Samsung gave it 4GB of RAM instead of 3GB, a 3,000 mAh battery pack instead of 2,600 mAh. The larger battery pack is certainly a godsend after the battery woes of the regular S6 ge, but the bigger Super AMOD display means the ge+ may be less energy efficient than its predecessor. I’m worried about the ge+’s battery life in the real world, even with all the battery saving features offered in the settings. 

I love big phones. I didn’t at first— Samsung’s part of the reason why—but now I’m particularly partial to them. The Galaxy S6 ge+ is really comfortable to use. Its large size actually works in your favor for heavy multitasking fast-typing situations. But whenever I’d hold it, I was afraid it’d slip out of my h. At least with its smaller counterpart, I can grip its 5.1-inch screen all the way around; at 5.7 inches, I can barely reach.

Samsung’s Touchz interface has been scaled up to fit the Galaxy S6 ge+’s larger screen. There’s more room for icons on the Home screen, but otherwise it’s the same software experience you get on the smaller Galaxy S6 ge—including the bundled-in Microsoft Office applications that you can only disable from the Applications Manager.

A few ge extras

ke the Galaxy S6 ge, the ge+ offers a few extra software features that take advantage of the curved display. You can now add up to five application shortcuts to the edge screen, in addition to five favorite contacts, bring them up from any app—previously, you could only access them from the Home screen. It’s a convenient feature, but I don’t even use this ability on my S6 ge. There’s also a tiny tab that peeks out from the corner of the display’s edge it gave me flashbacks of the Multi ndow tab from older versions of Touchz.

The ge+ also comes equipped with a few new camera modes, including YouTube live broadcasting video collages. ve broadcasting is simple to set up: all you have to do is link it to your account. I couldn’t try out the live streaming feature myself during my hs-on, but I like that YouTube is directly integrated into the device’s native camera app. I’m curious to get a peek at what the privacy settings are during a live broadcast, though.

Additionally, the ge+ will come equipped for Samsung y—which is finally launching in September—as well as Ultra High Quality Audio (UHQ), a software feature that acts like an audio booster for downloaded streaming music. You can read more about in my hs-on with the Galaxy Note 5. 

A little too much, too soon

I would have loved to see the Galaxy S6 ge+ announced alongside the Galaxy S6 ge, just as Apple introduced its ione 6+ alongside the smaller-sized ione 6. (I would have probably bought the ge+ instead.) But, announced alone half a year later, the ge+ seems sort of futile. o is this phone for? Is there really a dem from users who wanted a bigger Galaxy S6 ge? Or is it for the Note 5 users who don’t want to worry about carting around a stylus? My feeling is that this is simply Samsung overdoing it again.

Regardless, I really liked the Galaxy S6 ge+. It’s a great example of the kind of quality smartphone-making Samsung is capable of.