The original Samsung Galaxy Note was the first smartphone with a greater than 5-inch screen

In November 2009, the HTC HD2 was launched with a 4.3-inch screen. At the time, this was the largest screen available on a smartphone, and it caused one reviewer to say that there could never be a larger smartphone screen ever. Time proved that reviewer wrong, and today some Android mini models sport a 5-inch screen. The phone that led the way toward larger and larger Android smartphone displays was the Samsung Galaxy Note.

Announced on September 1st,  2011 the Galaxy Note was the first smartphone to sport a greater than 5-inch screen with its 5.3-inch Super AMOLED display (with a resolution of 800 x 1280). It also had the largest battery ever seen inside a smartphone at the time, a removable 2500mAh juicer. And it was the first Android model with a built-in stylus.

The Galaxy Note featured a dual-core 1.4GHz CPU and the Mali-400 MP4 GPU. 1GB of RAM was inside with 32GB of native storage, and a 32GB capacity microSD slot was available to those who needed additional storage. The rear-facing 8MP camera came with an aperture of f/2.6, and a front-facing 2MP was used for selfies and video chats.

The Galaxy Note was a success. By March, 5 million units had been shipped. Because the device was unique, Samsung used marketing techniques not seen before, including creating a video showing an elephant playing with the phone (big phone for big animal).

By September 2012, Samsung had released the Samsung Galaxy Note II with a larger 5.5-inch screen. The display offered a 720 x 1280 HD resolution. The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 arrived the next year carrying a 5.7-inch display with a 1080 x 1920 resolution. While the size of the display stayed the same at 5.7-inches for the Samsung Galaxy Note 4, the resolution rose to 1440 x 2560. And that is the same size and resolution used on the current model, the Samsung Galaxy Note 5.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 7, expected to be released later this year, is rumored to be equipped with a 5.8-inch display carrying a 1440 x 2560 resolution. Samsung will supposedly skip the Galaxy Note 6 name and go right to the Galaxy Note 7. By doing this, the company will align the Galaxy Note series with the Galaxy S range. In addition, Samsung was concerned that consumers would think that the Galaxy Note 6 was a generation older than the Samsung Galaxy S7.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 will be unveiled on August 2nd with a rumored release scheduled for the middle of that month.