The Note 5 Has a Great New Design (Kind Of)

The Note 5’s design is a lot like when a friend buys a used car — “it’s new to me, all right?” The Note 5 pulls a lot of design influence from the Galaxy S6, and to be more specific, the S6 Edge. However unlike the Edge—which we felt was like holding a normal phone but backwardsbecause of its front-sloping screen—the Note 5 puts the curves on the back keeping the 5.7-inch quad HD display a plain old flat panel, which makes sense if you ever want to use that handy S-pen.

The materials are also different. Last year’s Note 4 was more akin to the Galaxy Alphathan the S5, but the Note series realigns with the S series and ditches the faux leather and goes all Gorilla Glass 4 (on the front and back) with aluminum along the sides.

Speaking of the aluminum siding, the sloping glass back makes those sides pretty thin, so the Note 5 isn’t exactly the most comfortable phone I’ve ever held, but also not the worst. Aside from that, the obround hardware button is still there with the requisite biometric sensors packed inside.

Basically, the Note 5 screams premium, which makes sense. Since HTC seems dethroned from its position as THE maker of jewelry-grade Android smartphones, Samsung is more than happy to fill the gap.