OnePlus 2 vs Samsung Galaxy S6

OnePlus 2
OnePlus 2

It's no secret we've loved Samsung's flagship smartphone this year – we gave the Samsung Galaxy S6 a 4.5 out of 5 stars review and crowned it the "best phone in the world" in our rankings.

But OnePlus created one of the best handsets of 2014 and it has followed it up with a new handset. It's an interesting comparison to see what the start up has done to compete with the big guns like Samsung.

Here's a side by side comparison of what the phones are like.

Design

OnePlus 2

Samsung's Galaxy S6 has a much more premium feel than previous iterations of the handset. There's a glass back with a metal frame around the edges this time around. The Galaxy S6 Edge even has curved screens on the side of the phone giving it a brand new look you can't get anywhere else on the market.

The OnePlus 2 looks quite similar to the original phone but this time has a metal frame with a plastic back. You can swap the rear over for a bamboo, rosewood or even Kevlar if you fancy something a little more premium.

Overall it's looking much the same as before - but that's not a big issue as we really liked the design of the first phone.

Display

Samsung Galaxy S6

Samsung's created one of the best smartphone displays we've ever seen with a 5.1-inch Super AMOLED touchscreen with a 1440 x 2560 QHD resolution. That results in a huge 577ppi and there's no denying it looks beautiful on the eye.

OnePlus has kept to the 1080p 5.5-inch display we saw on the original phone and it has a 401ppi. It's good to see OnePlus has kept the larger form factor but Samsung won't be upping its display anytime soon – it has the Galaxy Note 4 and whatever comes next to keep that range covered.

Power

OnePlus 2

Samsung's Galaxy S6 uses the company's own produced Exynos 7420 processor. It's an octa-core set up made up of a quad-core Cortex A53 clocked at 1.5GHz and a quad-core Coretex A57 clocked at 2.1GHz.

Under the hood on the OnePlus 2 is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 octa-core processor with either 3GB of RAM or 4GB of RAM depending on whether you buy the 16GB version of the 64GB version.

It's important to note some manufacturers have struggled with the processor in the OnePlus 2 as it has had some overheating issues on phones such as the Sony Xperia Z3+. We'll have to do some proper testing with the phone to see how it turns out on the OnePlus 2.

OS

OnePlus 2

Samsung's Galaxy S6 has the latest version of Android 5.1 Lollipop on board but the biggest improvement comes in what the phone doesn't have; it has dropped the bloatware. A lot of the traditionally annoying Samsung apps have been dropped for a much better looking UI experience and all around cleaner experience.

The OnePlus 2 has Android 5.1 Lollipop running on the phone but it runs the frm's Oxygen UI on top to give it a different look and feel than you'll find on other smartphones.

James Peckham

James is Managing Editor for Android Police. Previously, he was Senior Phones Editor for TechRadar, and he has covered smartphones and the mobile space for the best part of a decade bringing you news on all the big announcements from top manufacturers making mobile phones and other portable gadgets. James is often testing out and reviewing the latest and greatest mobile phones, smartwatches, tablets, virtual reality headsets, fitness trackers and more. He once fell over.