Samsung Galaxy A05s review

Market competitors

The Samsung Galaxy A05s is a pretty budget device. The 6GB RAM original version is priced at INR 17,499 ($210) from Samsung India, and that's before including the additional savings and special offers Samsung is currently offering.

In a bid to make the Galaxy A05s even more affordable and attainable, Samsung also released a 4GB RAM version of the phone, with an MSRP of INR13,499 ($162). That effectively leaves us with two price points to consider.

So let's look at devices below $230 and phones below $180. Those $50 difference are actually quite substantial.

Let's look at the rest of Samsung's roster first. Right off the bat, we can see that the Galaxy A24 4G is surprisingly selling for around $175 at the time of writing. However, that is US pricing, and this model does not seem to be officially available in India.

The Galaxy A14 5G is available in India, and while it is the 2023 model and technically no longer the latest one, it is selling for a very competitive INR 14,499 ($174) for the 4GB/64GB version and INR 16,999 ($204) for the 6GB/128GB one. You might want to consider it over the A05s for its 5G connectivity and potentially more powerful chipset. The rest of the specs sheet is quite similar between the two.

Xiaomi has a few viable devices, like the Xiaomi Redmi 12. It has a big display like the Galaxy A05s and an LCD and one with a FullHD+ resolution as well. The Redmi 12 has an official IP53 ingress protection rating, notably an 8MP ultrawide camera. The Redmi also has an IR blaster and is running a marginally better MediaTek Helio G88 chipset.

Samsung Galaxy A14 5G • Xiaomi Redmi 12 • Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 • Tecno Pova 5 Pro

Next, we recommend considering the ever-popular Redmi Note 12. It is also a bit more expensive than the 4GB Galaxy A05s, but it does offer an IP53 rating, 120Hz AMOLED display and 33W charging. It also comes with an ultrawide camera and an arguably better Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 chipset.

Tecno has at least a couple of interesting options around this price point. We would personally go for the Pova 5 Pro for the 120Hz IPS display refresh rate, the more powerful and superior Dimensity 6080 chipset, the stereo speakers and the much faster 68W charging on its 5,000 mAh battery. However, while technically inferior in most aspects, the Spark 10 Pro did manage a notably better battery endurance in our testing. So, we are tossing it in the mix as well.

Our verdict

Samsung has put in some extra effort to update the Galaxy A05s this year. We appreciate the move to FullHD+ for the display resolution, the noticeably higher 128GB onboard storage (though still eMMC), the higher resolution and 1080p selfie camera, and the move to 25W charging. All of these are valuable and noteworthy upgrades over the Galaxy A04s.

While technically, the Snapdragon 680 chipset also falls in the upgrades column; we can't say we appreciate its inclusion on a 2023 phone, especially not in combination with eMMC storage. The reality is that the Galaxy A05s is just slow in a noticeable manner. Even the "Core" version of One UI struggles to deliver smooth animations and transitions. To be clear, it never actually stutters, but it is not an overly pleasant experience, only made worse by the sluggish pixel response times of the display. We don't appreciate the lack of display refresh rate settings or color settings either.

The singular speaker on the Galaxy A05s is also nothing to phone home about. The phone also lacks NFC, and several sensors are missing from its roster. The camera setup is still limited in terms of versatility since there is neither an ultrawide nor a telephoto. And while it does a decent job in good lighting, the main camera's low-light performance is mostly disappointing.

The dedicated microSD card slot and 3.5mm audio jack are both nice-to-haves but hardly exclusive to the Galaxy A05s nor enough to make up for some of the other more central issues we encountered. If you really want a Samsung at this price point, then we would probably go for the Galaxy A14 5G or Galaxy A24 4G instead, depending on where you live and your budget. We liked our time with both of those devices more than the A05s. Or, alternatively, shop around a bit more.

Pros

• Nice design with solid build quality.
• Good battery life.
• Decent daylight camera performance.
• Expandable storage with dedicated microSD slot; a 3.5mm audio jack.

Cons

• Lackluster LCD with ghosting and fixed refresh rate.
• No NFC, gyroscope, magnetometer or compass.
• (Barely) average speaker loudness.
• The Snapdragon 680 chipset has relatively poor performance with UI slowdowns.
• Relatively poor low-light camera performance.
• No video stabilization.