With rumors for months indicating that the Galaxy S7 could arrive earlier next year, all eyes have been trained on Samsung and whether or not it will reveal any detail about the smartphone's launch date. Last week, a leak indicated the device would land at the end of February, specifically on the 21st, but now information has emerged that it will be launched sometime in the first week of January.

The latest leak about the Galaxy S7 and its curved screen variant, the Galaxy S7 Edge, indicates that they are already being tested at U.S. carrier AT&T. This information was made public on the Twitter account associated with the tipster Evan Blass. In his tweet, he stated that the devices are being tested with the carrier and they have the model number SM-G930A and SM-G935A.  

If the leak is true, it indicates that the devices are already in their testing phase and are being sent to carriers before an earlier launch in January 2016. If the launch is being pushed forward, it could mean they will arrive in the first week of the year, most probably just before the Consumer Electronics Show kicks off on Jan. 6. Samsung could be bringing the release forward to try and win back customers it lost to Apple and other smartphone manufacturers from China. However, Forbes states that lowering the prices of the existing models seem to have attracted customers again and the Galaxy S6 and the S6 Edge are selling better than they were previously.

Meanwhile, the model numbers that were featured in the current leak point toward the Galaxy S7 having the number SM-G930A, and its curved screen variant having the number SM -G935A. This year, the vanilla S6 with standard bezels had the SM-G920 model number and the Galaxy S6 Edge had the SM-G925 number. However, even while the model numbers point to the Galaxy S7 in testing, there is no guarantee when the devices will be released.