US and UK carriers announce Samsung Galaxy S4 pre-orders

Samsung Galaxy S4 fans, be prepared to use your credit cards because it's pre-order season. A number of UK carriers, including Vodafone, EE and O2 have the new Android smartphone flagship on pre-order today, while in the United States AT&T announced that prospective buyers will have to wait until next month to get their hands on a new Galaxy S4 before it hits online and brick-and-mortar stores.

AT&T revealed that the Galaxy S4 will be available for pre-order starting with April 16 for $249.99 on a two-year contract. The carrier does not specify which model will be offered, but the 32GB Galaxy S4 is a good guess judging by the price of its predecessor at launch, during pre-orders. If 16GB, the price would be $50 higher than Galaxy S3 at launch and what iPhone 5 sells for today.

Vodafone UK offers the Galaxy S4 for pre-order, with no upfront cost, starting with GBP42 per month on a two-year plan. For the money customers get unlimited minutes and texts and 2GB of cellular data. The carrier also accepts trading-in a touchscreen phone, which makes the smartphone available, again, with no upfront cost, for GBP37 per month on a two-year plan (without a trade customers have to pay GBP69 instead). The plan comes with unlimited minutes and texts and 1GB of cellular data.

EE (formerly known as Everything Everywhere) also lists the Galaxy S4 for pre-order. For the smartphone, the lowest upfront cost is GBP19.99 for GBP56 per month on a two-year plan, while the highest upfront cost is GBP269.99 for GBP31 per month for the same contract length. Both plans feature unlimited minutes and texts, but the former comes with 8GB of cellular data while the latter only offers 500MB of cellular data.

O2 lists the Galaxy S4 for pre-order with an online exclusive offer. Customers have to shell out GBP99.99 in upfront cost and GBP37 per month with a two-year contract. The plan includes unlimited minutes and texts and 2GB of cellular data.