Recently, Samsung announced the Samsung Galaxy A21s which is expected to come to Europe on the 22nd of June for a price of €209.
At a passing glance, the phone looks quite good with its affordable price point combined with a 6.5-inch HD+ display with a resolution of 1,600 x 720 pixels, 13MP selfie, 48MP primary lens, 8MP ultra-wide, 2MP depth and 2MP macro camera. You will then get an impressive battery life from the a 5,000mAh battery with 15W fast charging.
However, the phone comes with a new Samsung chipset powering it, and by the looks of things, it may struggle to keep up with low-cost alternatives from the likes of Xiaomi and Realme.
Phones priced under £200
€209 works out as £188, so let’s get some perspective and see what else you can buy.
Realme 6i for £189
- 48MP Quad Camera | Ultra-wide | Macro | Depth | 16MP selfie
- 5000 mAh Battery + 18w Fast Charge
- MediaTek Helio G80 with upto 4Gb RAM
- Upto 128GB internal storage
Realme 6s for €199
- 6.5 inches 1080 x 2400 pixels
- 48MP, 8MP, 5MP macro, 2MP depth
- 4300 mAh Battery + 30w Fast Charge
- MediaTek Helio G90T with upto 4Gb RAM
- Upto 128GB internal storage
Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T – £177
- Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T is powered by an octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 processor and come with 4GB of RAM
- It is powered by a 4000mAh non-removable battery. t supports proprietary fast charging
- It has 48-megapixel camera and comes with 64GB ROM
- Connectivity options on the Xiaomi Redmi Note 8T are Wi-Fi 802.11 a, GPS, NFC, and USB Type-C
Xiaomi Redmi Note 9S – £194.99
- 6.67 display at 1080 x 2400 pixels
- Snapdragon 720G
- 48MP, 8MP, 5MP macro, 2MP depth
- 16MP selfie
- 5020mAH battery, 18W charge
Nokia 5.3 – £149.99
- 6.55 inches 720 x 1600 pixels
- Snapdragon 665
- 13MP, 5MP, 2MP macro, 2MP depth
- 8MP selfie
- 4000 mAh battery, 10W charge
Chipset Specification Comparison
While Samsung may have an advantage with its 8nm fabrication process, it fails to offer much else with competing chipsets at a similar price point.
In particular, either the Realme 6i or Realme 6S are priced almost identically, offer the same camera specification, and vastly superior chipsets. I have not compared the Helio G90T of the Relame 6S here, but it is an upper mid-range chipset comfortably outperforming the G80 on the 6i by a considerable margin.
Similarly, the Redmi Note 9S is not much more expensive and uses the excellent Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G, a better display and the same camera specification.
Samsung Exynos 850
- 8nm fabrication process
- 8 x Arm Cortex-A55 @ 2Ghz
- ARM Mali-G52 GPU
Samsung Exynos 9611
- 10nm fabrication process
- 4x 2.3 GHz Cortex-A73
- 4x 1.7 GHz Cortex-A53
- Mali-G72 MP3
Qualcomm Snapdragon 460
- 11nm fabrication process
- 4 x 1.8 GHz Kryo 240 Gold – Cortex-A73 derivative
- 4 x 1.8 GHz Kryo 240 Silver – Cortex-A53 derivative
- Adreno 610 (up to Full HD+)
Qualcomm Snapdragon 665
- 11nm fabrication process
- 4x 2.0 GHz Kryo 260 Gold – Cortex-A73 derivative
- 4x 1.8 GHz Kryo 260 Silver – Cortex-A53 derivative
- Adreno 610 (Full HD+ / 2520×1080)
Mediatek Helio G70
- 12nm fabrication process
- 2x Cortex-A75 at 2GHz
- 6x Cortex-A55 at 1.8GHz
- Mali-G52 2EEMC2 @ 950MHz
Mediatek Helio G80
- 12nm fabrication process
- 2x Cortex-A75 at 2.0GHz
- 6x Cortex-A55 at 1.7GHz
- Mali-G52 2EEMC2 @ 820MHz
Overall
Hardware specs are not the be-all and end all, plenty of phones offer a superior experience than the sum of their parts, that literally describes Apple phones. So, you shouldn’t completely rule out the Samsung Galaxy A21s, but it certainly doesn’t look that appealing compared to the affordable brands.
I think at the lower end of the market, specs are more important too, you want the biggest bang for your buck making sure the phone runs smoothly and is a pleasure to use rather than minor software differences between brands.
