Samsung's Galaxy S20 is now available in a Tactical Edition: an enhanced version of the flagship phone designed for military use

The Galaxy S20 Tactical Edition was revealed in a Samsung press release (via TechRadar) and is the successor to the Galaxy S9 Tactical Edition It has been given a variety of new features to help it survive in the field and work well with other military equipment It will only be offered to select IT partners and will not be available at local carrier stores

As an example of these new capabilities, Samsung boasts that the S20 TE will work with "tactical radios, drone feeds, laser rangefinder, external GPS, etc" In addition, like the regular S20, it supports 5G and WiFi 6

Samsung is also promoting the benefits of DeX desktop mode for planning and training purposes Meanwhile, the Bixby virtual assistant button has been remapped to launch and hide mission-critical apps

Of course, it is important that the S20 TE be able to withstand any situation, which is why it is housed in a chunky sand-colored case The case covers the entire back and sides of the phone, which is probably why the S20 TE appears to navigate using virtual buttons instead of gestures The touchscreen is adjustable so that it can be used with gloves on, which appears to be a useful feature for civilians

There is also a night vision mode that allows users to read their phones while wearing infrared goggles and a stealth mode that turns off all connections to the phone The release also mentions how secure the phone is thanks to Samsung's proprietary Knox security system and DualDAR

Unfortunately, no official specs are given for the S20 TE, so we don't know exactly what cameras or internal components are used The only sensor Samsung mentions is a 64MP camera, which appears to be the telephoto sensor found on the Galaxy S20 and Galaxy S20 Plus From the single image of the back, it appears to be the triple camera array of the S20, not the quad camera of the S20 Plus