It may be a little bit early in the year for the most anticipated smartphones to be launched, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t already get excited and talk about them. Despite the global slump in sales, 2017 was a good year for the smart phone. We saw several notable features. Such as better than all day battery life, greatly improved cameras and slim screen bezels. With such great innovation last year, we’re expecting a lot from the leading manufacturers this year. Here are five of the most exciting.

Samsung Galaxy S9

The first major player to release their latest offering will be Samsung. The Galaxy S9 will probably be released in March, on trend with previous years. It will probably not be dramatically different from the Galaxy S8, which was the best smartphone released in 2017. The Galaxy S8 featured a full-sized AMOLED screen, a brilliant camera, and stunning chassis made from metal and glass. All of this was in addition to previous favourite features such as waterproofing, wireless charging, and expandable storage. Something that is becoming increasingly rare these days – a headphone jack – was also included.

We’re expecting all of the above and slightly more this year. Perhaps we will see a slightly more refined design, and an improved camera. The Galaxy Note 8 had a dual lens camera. We expect that this will be added to the Galaxy S9.

iPhone 9, iPhone X2, iPhone SE2

To date, the iPhone X is the most stunning handset to be designed by Apple. It made a refreshing change from the similarity in smartphones they produced over the previous couple of years. However the iPhone X is extremely expensive – still costing the best part of £1,000. This is out of reach for a lot of people.

Nobody is entirely sure what the new iPhone will be called. Apple surprised us last year with the launch of the iPhone 8 and X, while leaving out the iPhone 9. So perhaps we could see an iPhone 9 and an iPhone X2 this year. There are also rumours that they are bringing back an old favourite – the iPhone SE. So perhaps there will even be an iPhone SE2 in the pipeline.

If the rumours are to be believed then Apple will release 3 phones this year, so the above could be fairly accurate. One thing that we do think is likely, is that the full-faced screen design is likely to be brought to all there new phones, so the headphone jack really could be a thing of the past for iPhone users. We tend to see the latest and greatest from Apple in September, although the iPhone X was actually released in November last year.

Sony Xperia

2018 could be the year that the Sony Xperia receives a long-time-coming facelift. The design has stayed relatively similar since 2013, which is a long time in the world of smartphones. We think Sony have been left behind by the others in the design department, as the current Xperia features sharp angles and plastic as opposed to curves and glass. Rumour has it that the newest creation will have some curved bezels and be a bit smaller than the previous models, but we will have to wait at least until the end of this month to see.

LG G7, LG V40

Last year saw the release of the LG G6 and LG V30, both great phones but unfortunately lacked the ‘wow factor’ of the curved screen edges. One thing the G6 did have going for it was the dual-lens camera, which is pretty unique even today. The camera featured a wide-angled lens, but the image quality wasn’t as great as the likes of Samsung and Sony. All of this means that LG definitely have something to prove in 2018, and we will hopefully see exactly what they have to offer for the year in April.

Google Pixel 3

Google decided to stay with the tried and tested method with the Pixel 2, by sticking to the somewhat outdated 16:9 screen for the original Pixel 2 and the 18:9 aspect ratio on the Pixel 2 XL. Unfortunately for them, this didn’t pay off too well as the Pixel 2 just looked dated compared to all of the other smartphones on the market, and the slightly larger Pixel 2 XL had screen quality issues.

Apart from this, the Pixel 2 is a great smartphone and features one of the best cameras available today. The Pixel 3 is bound to have sorted these problems as hopefully it will feature a nice thin bezel, and a new and improved OLED screen. It’s highly likely that the camera technology would have taken another leap forward as well, so the Pixel 3 will be a good contender for 2018. It will more than likely be released in the first week of October, as has been the case in previous years.