Galaxy S4 - The S4 is available for free from 28 per month on a 24-month contract with O2. This includes unlimited calls/texts and 1GB of data.
SIM-free - a 16GB device is available for 280.
Galaxy S5 - Tesco Mobile has announced that it will make the S5 available at no upfront cost from 34.50 per month with a 24-month contract. This will include 1,500 minutes, 5000 texts and 1GB of 4G data.
SIM-free pricing varies - the cheapest 16GB model we found was 520.
Overall
The S4 is considerably cheaper than the S5, which is to be expected.
The S5 is the better device and has the eye-catching features like the fingerprint scanner and heart rate monitor, but these aren't necessary for most users.
Our favourite features of the S5 are the water/dust protection, 16-megapixel camera, battery optimisations and Download Booster.
If you have a 24-month contract that's about to expire we can see the temptation in jumping to the latest model. Still, when it comes to value for money, we would recommend the S4, especially if you have tens or hundreds of employees to deploy to. It shares many of the core software features and the hardware is good enough to use in 2014.
