Samsung's Galaxy S4 World Tour landed in Sydney last night, with the electronics giant announcing that the handset will be available in Australia from Saturday April 27.
It will be available at Samsung stores and the big electronics chains outright for $899 for a 16GB model. All of the major local telcos will be ranging the phone too.
With so little time to make a decision, we're done the legwork in helping you find the best value plans for what will surely be one of this year's most popular phones.
We'll look at the middle rate plans for each of the carriers, which sits at about $60 a month. But, remember that the telcos also offer the phone at plans at both ends of this price: cheaper plans with fewer inclusions and more expensive plans with more data and unlimited calls and messaging.
Virgin Mobile: as the underdog in this race for your GS4 dollars, Virgin has the most competitive rates. $66 a month will cover the plan and handset repayments for the GS4, and buy you 3GB of data a month, $700 worth of calls (at $2.38 for a 2-minute call) and unlimited text messaging.
And, in case you've forgotten, Virgin is owned by Optus and shares its network, so you get the same coverage as with Optus, including 4G services.
Vodafone: with 4G services starting in just a few months, the GS4 is bound to be a big deal to the folks at Vodafone. As such, they are offering an extra 1GB of data for the first 12-months on plans of $60p/m or higher. Including handset repayments you'll pay $65 and get 2.5GB of data for the first 12-month, 1.5GB thereafter. You also get $650 worth of calls (charged at $2.36 for a 2-minute call), unlimited calls to other Vodafone customers and unlimited text messaging.
Optus: for one reason or another, Optus isn't choosing to be particularly persuasive with its GS4 pricing. You'll pay $67 per month for a GS4 plan, with 1.5GB of data each month, $650 worth of calls (charged at $2.15 per 2-minutes) and unlimited text. You can also make unlimited calls to other Optus phone numbers.
Telstra: with the bulk of Australia's mobile subscribers on its network, Telstra probably doesn't need to be that competitive. And, it isn't. We haven't seen the telco's $60 plans for the GS4, but for $87 (including the handset repayment) you're getting similar inclusions to the plans from the competition: 1.5GB data, $800 worth of calls and unlimited text.
Telstra is also selling the phone outright for $816, which is a fair bit cheaper than the official price from Samsung.
There are better deals still if you shop online for an unlocked handset. Kogan is selling the GS4 (16GB, Black) for $799. Mobicity is advertising the Octa-core version of the phone for the same price, or the 4G version (the same as the model sold by the telcos) for $829.
