Extra perspective is always a good thing. While we strive to spend a good bit of time in reviewing a phone, nothing quite gives you a full impression of a phone like using it day-in and day-out for weeks and months on end. The Galaxy Note 5 really won us (and many others, from the looks of it) over in our first evaluation of it — and again after two months — and now that we've reached the six month point since launch it's worth yet another revisit. It's fair to say right from the start that this big phone has held up over time, but what about the finer points of the experience? That's what we're here to evaluate.

Solid, but sometimes slippery, hardware

2015 marked a huge step forward in the hardware quality of Samsung's leading devices, and the Galaxy Note 5 is the prime example of that. It's still a strikingly attractive phone, so long as you enjoy the bright mirrored color options, and you can't deny that the artful combination of metal and glass can turn heads. Verizon is offering the Pixel 4a for just $10/mo on new Unlimited lines And after months of daily use, it's held up well for the most part. In terms of physical wear-and-tear, my Note 5 has never been placed in a case and looks no worse for it. Despite a few drops onto hard surfaces from cringe-worthy heights, I only have a couple small scuffs along the metal frame and some barely-noticeable scratches on the Gorilla Glass 4 display glass. I can't say the same about many of my previous phones. The Note 5 still looks great, but the tradeoff has been how slick it can be Despite the surprising durability, the slipperiness of the whole thing has worn on me in these six months. The curved glass on the back of the Note 5 definitely helps you get a grip on the sides, but the entirety of the back being one solid glass surface doesn't give you enough to hold onto. It's enough when you're just holding the phone and reading something, but when it comes to typing, interacting with the screen and manipulating items using one hand you start to feel it shifting more than you'd like. Add to that an almost unmanageable amount of fingerprints and smudges that accumulate on the back glass, and you have a recipe for at minimum feeling uncomfortable holding the phone and at worst dropping it. One aspect of the Note 5's hardware that hasn't faded in any way since launch is the display. The QHD Super AMOLED Panel wowed me the minute I took it out of the box, and six months on it's still just glorious to look at every time I wake the phone from sleep. Colors are bright (although by design, not particularly accurate), everything looks amazingly crisp and the screen can get both super bright and very dim when necessary. I'm not sure what else I can expect from a display on a smartphone at this point. Spectacular camera

What can you say about the Note 5's camera that hasn't already been said? It's a pretty common refrain at this point to gush over the speed of the whole experience and the quality of the resulting photos, and even after six months with this camera I haven't found another that matches it. Being able to quickly launch the camera with two presses of the home button hasn't lost its utility, nor has the ability to instantly capture HDR photos in quick succession without any extra time waiting for processing. Add in the full suite of manual controls and RAW picture output when you need it, and you have a fantastic complete package. Take a look at some of my favorite shots from the Note 5 in this gallery.

If there's a single knock to be applied here, it's that by default the Note 5's screen is so aggressive in making every image on it look supernaturally great that you get an unrealistic view of what your photos actually look like. It's great when you're viewing images on the web or want wonderful graphics in a game, but when it comes to getting the most accurate view of how other people are going to see your photos online, viewing them on your Note 5's screen gives a bit of a distorted view. (Changing the display settings to "Basic" certainly mitigates this effect.) The experience