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The Galaxy S5 has been officially launched in Australia and the major telcos are showing off their plans and pricing.
(Credit: Andrew Hoyle/CNET)
Telstra was first out of the gate, trumpeting that it would take pre-orders for the Galaxy S5 from 9am on 27 March.
Plan-wise, it was pushing the AU$70 Accelerate plan with AU$12 monthly handset repayments. That AU$82 per month gets you AU$700 of calls and MMS, unlimited local texts and 1.5GB of data. Over the 24 months, you’ll pay AU$1968.
Or just buy the phone outright for AU$912.
Telstra will also stock the full range of Gear smartwatches: the Gear 2, Gear Neo and Gear Fit. All of these will retail for the standard RRPs: AU$369 for the Gear 2 and AU$249 for the Neo and Fit.
However, Telstra is — somewhat bizarrely — offering the Gear Fit on contract. Telstra says that “when connected to an eligible mobile plan” you’ll pay AU$10 a month for the Fit over 24 months, which saves you AU$9.
Vodafone came a close second with its announcement. No word on the wearables range, but the S5 will be available across the full range of 12 and 24 month plans.
Similar to the HTC One M8, the best deal for data seems to be the Red AU$80 plan. With the handset repayments, you’ll pay AU$84 a month for unlimited calls, MMS and SMS. Data wise, Vodafone is doubling the data allowance from 2.5GB to a whopping 5GB although the fine print suggests this double data is only available until 15 June. In all, you’ll pay a minimum of AU$2016 over the 24 months.
Virgin Mobile will also be stocking the handset on its AU$60 mobile plan. For AU$73 per month, you get unlimited Virgin-to-Virgin calls, unlimited standard text messages, and — if you sign up before 11 May — data doubled from 1.5GB per month to 3GB per month. It will cost a minimum of AU$1752.
Optus is offering a variety of different plans for the S5, with the cheapest way to get the handset being the AU$35 per month MyPlan with AU$26 per month handset repayment. This gets you 200 minutes per month and 200MB of data. The next MyPlan tier is AU$50, with an AU$21 monthly handset fee, 450 minutes and 500MB included data. One of the more competitive deals for those who pre-order before 10 April is the AU$60 MyPlan with an AU$16 monthly handset repayment. This gives a bonus 500MB of data bringing the total to 1.5GB and 600 minutes. The rest of the Optus plans can be found on the website.
The telco will also be stocking the full range of wearables with the Gear Fit and Gear 2 Neo available for AU$240 outright. To add these to an existing contract costs AU$10 a month. Outright the Gear 2 is AU$360 or $15 per month with a contract.
We’ll be updating this story as more local carriers begin talking pricing for the S5 and the Gear range.
