July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

In terms of smartphones, Samsung seems to have one main imperative these days: Make them larger.

Like the Galaxy Note II, Samsung’s new Galaxy Mega is proof that Samsung is intent on creating smartphones at every conceivable size — even if those sizes are hugely impractical for mobile devices.

The Galaxy Mega comes in two forms — one with a 6.3-inch screen, the other with a 5.8-inch screen. Both devices are larger than the 5.5-inch Galaxy Note II, which is either good or bad depending on which side of the “bigger is better” debate you fall on.

Source: Devindra Hardawar/VentureBeat

Make it stop.

Spec-wise, the two Mega versions offer slightly different numbers. While the 6.3-inch model comes with a HD display, 1.7 GHz processor and LTE/HSPA radios, the smaller version offers a reduced screen resolution and less powerful processor. Little of that really matters, however, because these are devices that Samsung is selling on screen size, not processor speed.

In terms of style, the Galaxy Mega is more or less identical to every other Galaxy phone, which makes press images largely useless if you want to get a sense of how big the thing is.

A good reference point, however, is Huawei’s Ascend Mate, the 6.1-inch smartphone monstrosity the company unveiled earlier this year. As you can see in the photo to the right, it’s tough to talk on these massive phones without looking impossibly goofy (no offense to VentureBeat’s Sean Ludwig, who always looks great.) Just imagine squeezing something like the Ascend Mate into your pocket.

Samsung says the Mega will make its way to Europe some time next month, and possibly elsewhere soon after.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Huawei, you’ve successfully built the world’s largest smartphone with the 6.1-inch Ascend Mate. Congratulations?

This CES has been fairly quiet when it comes to new smartphone announcements, so Huawei’s reveal yesterday of the massive Ascend Mate was a nice little reminder of previous years. But after playing around with the phone for a few minutes, I can confirm that it’s about as silly as you’d imagine.

The Ascend Mate simply looks and feels massive. I can’t imagine anyone finding it comfortable enough to use as their daily phone (let alone fit it into their pocket).

I had similar initial reservations about Samsung’s Galaxy Note in 2011, but at 5.3-inches, at least it looked like a typical phone and fit into your pocket. Samsung also managed to make its successor, the Note II, thinner and lighter (while also squeezing in a slightly bigger screen).

Avoiding just about everything great about modern smartphone designs — light weight, thin frames, a focus on pragmatic features — the Ascend Mate simply seems to say, “Fuck you, I’m big.” That may not be the best way to market a phone.

Below, we’ve compared it to the iPhone 4, Nexus 4, and the iPad Mini. Not surprisingly, when placed against the iPad Mini, the Ascend Mate looks far more like a tablet than a phone.

Ultimately, I can sum up the way I feel about the Ascend Mate with my response to Huawei’s rep when I first held it. “No, just no.”