Samsung Galaxy S4 review: Supernova

Synthetic benchmarks

Update, May 9: We added the I9500 Galaxy S4 benchmarks.

The Samsung Galaxy S4 comes in two versions - one uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 chipset, while the other uses Samsung's own Exynos 5 Octa.

The Snapdragon version packs four Krait 300 cores clocked at 1.9GHz with 2GB of RAM and Adreno 320 GPU. The Exynos one has four Cortex-A15 cores at 1.6GHz that with 2GB of RAM and a tri-core PowerVR SGX544. Both versions should offer top notch performance, but the Exynos one packs a second group of four cores - Cortex-A7 clocked at 1.2GHz - which can be used during light load situations to reduce power usage.

The Galaxy Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600) edges out the HTC One and LG Optimus G Pro in single-threaded (Benchmark Pi) and multi-threaded (Linpack) performance, both these handsets use the same chipset but with the CPU clocked at 1.7GHz. The Exynos-powered Galaxy S4 meanwhile is clocked even lower but offers virtually the same performance as the Snapdragon version.

Note: The Snapdragon 600-powered Galaxy S4, the I9505, is marked S600, while the Exynos 5 Octa one, the I9500, is marked Octa.

Benchmark Pi

Lower is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  132
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  132
• LG Optimus G Pro
  147
• HTC One
  151
• Sony Xperia Z
  264
• HTC Butterfly
  266
• Oppo Find 5
  267
• HTC One X+
  280
• LG Optimus G
  285
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  305
• HTC One X (Tegra 3)
  330
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  350
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  359
• Meizu MX 4-core
  362
• Nexus 4
  431

Linpack

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  791
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  788
• LG Optimus G Pro
  743
• HTC One
  646
• Sony Xperia Z
  630
• HTC Butterfly
  624
• LG Optimus G
  608
• Oppo Find 5
  593
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  214.3
• Nexus 4
  213.5
• Meizu MX 4-core
  189.1
• HTC One X+
  177.7
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  175.5
• HTC One X
  160.9
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  141.5

Geekbench 2 is a cross-platform benchmark, which allows us to compare the Galaxy Samsung Galaxy S4 against the iPhone 5 and the difference is double. The HTC One and Optimus G Pro lag behind both Samsung Galaxy S4 versions too, with the Octa pulling slightly ahead. We should note that they are using a newer version of Android (4.2.2 vs. 4.1.2).

Geekbench 2

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  3324
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  3227
• LG Optimus G Pro
  3040
• HTC One
  2708
• Sony Xperia Z
  2173
• HTC Butterfly
  2143
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1845
• LG Optimus G
  1723
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  1661
• iPhone 5
  1601

Moving on to compound benchmarks, AnTuTu and Quadrant put the Galaxy Samsung Galaxy S4 on top, with the Octa version once again being slightly faster. The HTC One and the LG Optimus G Pro traded victories in both benchmarks.

AnTuTu

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  26275
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  24716
• HTC One
  22678
• Sony Xperia Z
  20794
• LG Optimus G Pro
  20056
• HTC Butterfly
  19513
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  15547
• Oppo Find 5
  15167

Quadrant

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  12446
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  12376
• LG Optimus G Pro
  12105
• HTC One
  11746
• Sony Xperia Z
  8075
• HTC One X+
  7632
• LG Optimus G
  7439
• Oppo Find 5
  7111
• HTC One X
  5952
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  5916
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  5450
• Meizu MX 4-core
  5170
• Nexus 4
  4567

Now let's look at the GPU benchmarks. We ran GLBenchmark 2.5 in 1080p off-screen mode, which is also the native screen resolution for the flagships. The Galaxy Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600) came out ahead of the HTC One here, which leads us to suspect that the GPU has been overclocked, just like the CPU. The S4 (Octa) was a couple of frames faster.

The Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa) also topped the Epic Citadel chart (again, a couple of frames ahead of S600), though it's getting too close to the software 60fps limit to show much of a difference. Still, this benchmark uses Unreal Engine, which is sometimes used in high-end 3D mobile games and shows real-world performance.

GLBenchmark 2.5 Egypt (1080p off-screen)

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  43
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  41
• HTC One
  37
• Oppo Find 5
  32
• Google Nexus 4
  32
• Sony Xperia Z
  31
• Sony Xperia ZL
  31
• Sony Xperia SP
  31
• Apple iPhone 5
  30
• LG Optimus G Pro
  30
• LG Optimus G
  21
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  17
• HTC One X
  11

Epic Citadel

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  59.8
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  57.1
• HTC One
  56.4
• Sony Xperia Z
  55.6
• LG Optimus G Pro
  54.2
• Nexus 4
  53.9
• Asus Padfone 2
  53.4
• LG Optimus G
  52.6
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  41.3
• Oppo Find 5
  38.6

Finally, JavaScript is blazing fast, beating all other phones we've tested so far. HTML5 performance as measured by Vellamo could use some work. We used the Android Browser for the test rather than Chrome, which also comes preinstalled.

SunSpider

Lower is better

• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  804
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  810
• Samsung Ativ S
  891
• Apple iPhone 5
  915
• Nokia Lumia 920
  910
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  972
• HTC One X+
  1001
• LG Optimus G Pro
  1011
• Motorola RAZR i XT890
  1059
• HTC One
  1124
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1192
• Meizu MX 4-core
  1312
• Sony Xperia Z
  1336
• LG Optimus G
  1353
• HTC Butterfly
  1433
• Nexus 4
  1971
• Oppo Find 5
  2045

Vellamo

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  2418
• HTC One
  2382
• Sony Xperia Z
  2189
• HTC One X (Tegra 3)
  2078
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
  2060
• Samsung Galaxy S4 (Octa)
  2056
• HTC Butterfly
  1866
• Oppo Find 5
  1658
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1641
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  1568
• LG Optimus G
  1522
• Meizu MX 4-core
  1468
• Nexus 4
  1310

The Galaxy Samsung Galaxy S4 is hands down one of the fastest smartpohnes on the market right now. There's very little difference between its two incarnations, even though practically everything about them is different - chipset maker, CPU and GPU architecture, the whole thing.

We suspect this is on purpose - Samsung wanted to guarantee that devs can expect the exact same level of performance form the Galaxy S4, regardless of which version the user has. And they've done an excellent job. But this isn't the best that Cortex-A15 is capable of - we might have to wait until the Galaxy Note III to get a true feel for its performance.