It might be a bit too late, but AT&T is finally launching the Samsung Galaxy S5 Mini on March 20 through both the company's outlets and online store.
The delay in the sale of the Galaxy S5 Mini, which was released for sale in other locations in July last year, was expected as there is a tendency for the mini versions of Samsung's flagship smartphones to arrive in the United States extremely late.
The Galaxy S5 Mini features a 4.5-inch, 720x1280 Super AMOLED display and is powered by Android 4.4.4 KitKat. The smartphone also has a 2MP front camera, 8MP rear camera and internal storage of 16GB with an expandable microSD card memory option. The device packs a 1.4GHz quad-core processor with 1.5GB of RAM.
The smartphone can be purchased from AT&T at the price of $428.99 without a contract or $99.99 with a two-year contract. The Galaxy S5 Mini can also be purchased with no down payment through the Next payment plan of AT&T, which will cost the customer a monthly payment of $14.30 over 30 months, $17.88 over 24 months or $21.48 over 20 months. The smartphone will operate on AT&T's 4G LTE network.
AT&T is only offering Charcoal Black versions of the Galaxy S5 Mini.
AT&T said that the smartphone earned a perfect five out of five stars in the company's Eco-Rating system, which rates the environmental effects of AT&T devices to allow customers to make better decisions on which devices to purchase.
Samsung's official announcement of the Galaxy S5 Mini showcased that the smaller device still packs many of the features of the larger Galaxy S5, including a fingerprint scanner and a heart rate monitor.
Samsung's trend of releasing smaller versions of its smartphones began with the Galaxy S3, when the company released a Galaxy S3 Mini to cater to people that preferred the same look and feel of the then flagship smartphone but at a smaller size.
It was then announced that the Galaxy S5 Mini would be launched for sale in Russia last year, with subsequent releases in other locations to follow.
It took AT&T almost a year to finally launch the Galaxy S5 Mini in the United States, but at least the smartphone is now available. The Galaxy S5 Mini is a budget alternative to the upcoming Galaxy S6 smartphone. If Samsung releases a Galaxy S6 Mini counterpart, it might take this long once again for the device to reach the United States.
