You might have noticed we’ve been posting a lot of stories about the Samsung Galaxy S2 recently. There’s good reason for that, as the S2 has been one of the fastest selling Android phones ever, quickly racking up five million sales. And that’s without having launched in the US yet! One thing we haven’t covered yet, and we feel we should, is how to actually get the best deal on a Samsung Galaxy S2 itself.
The first decision you have to make is whether to go with a contract or a pay-as-you-go option.
The contract will typically allow you to have a much lower upfront cost (as low as the first monthly bill) and you’re also sure to enjoy slightly better value for things like minutes, texts and internet allowances, although it’s likely that at some point you won’t use up all of your allowance, or go over it. Most mobile phone contracts are 18 or 24 months, meaning that you will have to keep your phone (and your plan) for quite some time, giving you less freedom in the long term. Finally, contracts are the most expensive over the long term.
The pay-as-you-go option has a very high upfront cost, as you’ll typically have to purchase the phone outright (or at a small discount) from your mobile provider. Once you’ve got the phone, you’ll be paying less each month (as you only need to buy as much credit as you use), but you’ll be receiving slightly worse value for money: £30 spent on a month of contract will usually get you a lot more than £30 spent on minutes, texts and internet individually. There are some good deals that nullify this, to some degree. The big advantage of the pay-as-you-go option is that you have much more freedom. You get to choose precisely how to spend your money, whether on minutes, texts or internet allowance, to suit your own usage patterns. You can even pay to have your phone unlocked and then switch providers.
It’s also possible to take a 12 month contract. These middle-of-the-road deals offer a lower (but still significant) upfront cost but a higher monthly rate. The advantage of the 12 month contract is the cost is spread out more evenly across the year, and you’re free to upgrade your phone or switch to a cheaper contract after a year, which seems a much more reasonable amount of time than two.
Now that we’ve laid out the trade-offs, let’s have a look at some specific deals for the Samsung Galaxy S2, starting with the contract deals. We’ll look at the best contract deals currently available for each price point, then move onto how to check for the latest deals using comparison websites, and what to look for.
Best Contract Deals
Here are some of the best contract deals on a Samsung Galaxy S2 currently available. These deals are changing all the time, so if you’ve spotted a better one then please let us know in the comments section!
Best Deal for £20: Vodafone Your Plan MI
£20.50 / month, 24 months, handset costs £69.
This plan is the cheapest contract deal I’ve found for the Galaxy S2, as you’ll save £10 off the normal price each month for all 24 months of the contract. For just over £20 a month, you’ll get 300 minutes, 3000 texts, and 250 MB of internet allowance.
The allowances are low, but reasonable for someone that makes calls infrequently. If you spend much of your time in a home or office with wireless internet, 250 MB of mobile internet allowance should be fine, but you will have to monitor your usage.
You do have to pay for the handset, but still have upfront costs of under £90, which is pretty good considering the low monthly price. Overall, this is an incredibly attractive deal for value-oriented consumers.
Click here to view more details and buy this contract.
Best Deal for £25: Three Internet Texter 900
£26.00 / month, 24 months, handset is £19.99
This text-based plan is quite generous, with 900 minutes and 5000 texts in your monthly usage allowance.
You also get a great 1 GB data allowance, which should be more than enough for even the most avid smartphone enthusiasts. You’ll also get free Skype-to-Skype calls, free Windows Live Messenger usage, and free voicemail.
This deal seems fairly good, particularly if you’re a big user of Skype or Windows Live messenger (aka MSN).
Click here to view more details and buy this contract.
Best Deal for £30: Voda Essentials £31
£31.00 / month, 24 months, handset is £49.99
This Vodafone plan offers 1200 minutes and unlimited texts, but doesn’t mention mobile internet. This means that it’s likely to be the smallest common allowance, 250 MB.
Even so, this contract sports a fairly low up-front cost and good value.
Click here to view more details and buy this contract.
Best Deal for £35: Vodafone Your Plan MI
£36.00 / month, 12 months, handset costs £99.
This is a rare example of a decently priced 12 month contract, this time from Vodafone. You’re given a 500 MB data allowance, 300 minutes and 300 texts. Overage charges are quite high however, with calls beyond your allowance being charged at 35p a minute (compared with the more common 20p or 25p).
Still, this is a good opportunity to break free after 12 months, and provides a nice half-way house between a low up-front cost and the ability to make a fairly quick exit.
For reference, the 24 month variant of this plan costs £33.50 a month and includes 500 minutes instead of 300, as well as the standard free phone. Total cost for the 12 month plan is £531, the total cost of the 24 month plan is £804.
Click here to view more details and buy this contract.
Best Deal for £40: Orange Panther 45
£40.00 / month, 24 months, handset is free.
The plan will be more than enough for even the busiest talker*, with 1200 minutes (20 hours) of call credit and 3000 texts. This is definitely one of the most expensive plans available, but you do get quite a lot for it. Beyond the aforementioned minutes and texts, you also get a generous 1GB usage limit (more than enough for strictly mobile use, and doesn’t include email use) and free use of the answering phone.
This contract is definitely on the less desirable end of the value scale, and is included more for reference than actual use. It works out to being a whopping £960 over the 24 months, more than double the upfront cost of the phone itself.
Click here to view more details and buy this contract.
*If you’re really concerned this might not enough, you could try one of O2’s unlimited deals for £62 a month… and possibly some other hobbies!
How to Choose a Good Contract Deal
There are also quite a few useful contract comparison websites which you can use to look at deals from multiple networks and retailers. The two I’ve used are omio.com and phones4u.com, but others are available too.
BillMonitor.com is an excellent resource for choosing the right plan based on your actual usage habits; given your login details it can check your usage patterns and advise you as to which plan would give you the best value.
Finally, you can also apply the standard array of discounts and vouchers to get better deals or money back. One good site for this is QuidCo.com, which offers money back offers on a wide range of products, including smartphones like the Galaxy S2.
Using these resources, you now must judge each deal as its presented. It’s a good idea to write things down on a bit of paper (real or virtual) as you go along, so you can get a clearer idea of the various deals, as there will be different ones between comparison websites. Remember to ensure that your plan fits your usage habits, so don’t pay extra for a plan that has unlimited texts if you only use a few dozen a month. You’ll be stuck with your choice for up to two years, so take the time to find the best deal!
If you’ve found a particularly good deal for the Samsung Galaxy S2, why not share it with us by leaving the details in the comments below? If it’s a top deal, we’ll add it to the article!
Best Pay-As-You-Go Deals
Here are some of the best pay-as-you-go deals on a Samsung Galaxy S2 currently available. These deals are changing all the time, so if you’ve spotted a better one then please let us know in the comments section!
O2: £479.99
Three: £499.99
Vodafone: £509.90
Orange: £509.90
You can also buy a sim-free Samsung Galaxy S2, often for cheaper than locked to a given network. Once you’ve got your sim-free phone, you may want to check out the new and popular pay-as-you go operator GiffGaff. They offer surprisingly good deals, frequently with unlimited texts and internet allowances.
Conclusion
I hope this has been a useful article! Be sure to let us know if you’ve found any great deals in the comments section. You can also write to us on Facebook or Twitter.