Samsung Galaxy A06 review

GSMArena Team, 11 September 2024.

Display

There is nothing particularly impressive or interesting about the display of the Galaxy A06. It is as basic as they come nowadays. It is a simple PLS LCD with a basic HD 720 x 1600 pixel resolution. It only has a 60Hz refresh rate. As we said, quite basic.

Samsung Galaxy A06 review

The panel in question doesn't get particularly bright either. In our testing, we measured a maximum of 564 nits of brightness. That was achieved by simply maxing out the brightness slider. The Galaxy A06 lacks any max auto overburn mode beyond that. At least an ambient light sensor controls the automatic display brightness perfectly competently.

Max display brightness test

White test pattern, 75% fill (nits)

  • Manual mode
  • Auto mode
Galaxy A06 Galaxy A06
564
6.7" PLS LCD 720 x 1600 px
Realme C55 Realme C55
546
6.72" IPS LCD 1080 x 2400 px
Xiaomi Redmi 12 Xiaomi Redmi 12
541
6.79" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
Honor Magic5 Lite Honor Magic5 Lite
531
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Galaxy A14 5G Galaxy A14 5G
519
6.6" PLS LCD 1080 x 2408 px
Tecno Pova 5 Pro Tecno Pova 5 Pro
509
6.78" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
Poco M6 Pro Poco M6 Pro
493
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Redmi Note 13 4G Redmi Note 13 4G
492
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Redmi Note 13 5G Redmi Note 13 5G
488
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Xiaomi Poco C65 Xiaomi Poco C65
482
6.74" IPS LCD 720 x 1600 px
 Galaxy A05s Galaxy A05s
468
6.7" PLS LCD 1080 x 2400 px
Tecno Spark 10 Pro Tecno Spark 10 Pro
466
6.8" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
Galaxy A24 4G Galaxy A24 4G
464
6.5" Super AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
Poco X5 Poco X5
456
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
 Galaxy A25 Galaxy A25
434
6.5" AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
 Galaxy A15 Galaxy A15
372
6.5" Super AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
 Galaxy A15 5G Galaxy A15 5G
363
6.5" Super AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
Xiaomi Redmi 13 Xiaomi Redmi 13
342
6.79" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
Redmi Note 13 4G Redmi Note 13 4G
1313
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Poco M6 Pro Poco M6 Pro
1053
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
 Galaxy A25 Galaxy A25
1030
6.5" AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
Galaxy A24 4G Galaxy A24 4G
1012
6.5" Super AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
Redmi Note 13 5G Redmi Note 13 5G
991
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Honor Magic5 Lite Honor Magic5 Lite
864
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
 Galaxy A15 Galaxy A15
808
6.5" Super AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
 Galaxy A15 5G Galaxy A15 5G
786
6.5" Super AMOLED 1080 x 2340 px
Poco X5 Poco X5
728
6.67" AMOLED 1080 x 2400 px
Realme C55 Realme C55
659
6.72" IPS LCD 1080 x 2400 px
Xiaomi Poco C65 Xiaomi Poco C65
607
6.74" IPS LCD 720 x 1600 px
Galaxy A06 Galaxy A06
564
6.7" PLS LCD 720 x 1600 px
Xiaomi Redmi 12 Xiaomi Redmi 12
541
6.79" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
Tecno Spark 10 Pro Tecno Spark 10 Pro
521
6.8" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
Galaxy A14 5G Galaxy A14 5G
519
6.6" PLS LCD 1080 x 2408 px
Tecno Pova 5 Pro Tecno Pova 5 Pro
509
6.78" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px
 Galaxy A05s Galaxy A05s
468
6.7" PLS LCD 1080 x 2400 px
Xiaomi Redmi 13 Xiaomi Redmi 13
448
6.79" IPS LCD 1080 x 2460 px

We measured a minimum brightness of 7 nits at point white, which is not ideal either. The display can't get too dim, either. There is some light bleed in blacks, but not too much. Contrast isn't too bad at around 1484:1.

In terms of more subjective observations, the display on the Galaxy A06 looks pretty bad in person. It is overly reflective and compounds with the rather low maximum brightness. The pixel response rate is pretty bad, too, with plenty of ghosting on screen.

Expectedly, the Galaxy A06 has no HDR support. It has no HDR decoder support either. On a more positive note, the phone does have the highest possible Widevine L1 DRM certification. Not that it is that needed since even without it streaming services like Netflix will serve up HD streams and saturate the phone's display resolution.

Battery life

5,000 mAh batteries have become the standard nowadays, precisely what the Galaxy A06 has.

The phone scored a solid 13:50 hours of Active Use Score in our testing. The Galaxy A06 did particularly well in the voice call section of the testing, for what that's worth.

Charging speed

Unfortunately, we had some trouble with our charging test on the Galaxy A06. We tried testing with two different Samsung 25W chargers and a known-good 65W third-party charger with support for SFC. No matter which charger we chose, our review unit refused to charge at more than 2W.

Samsung Galaxy A06 review

The odd thing is that the phone recognized the charger since it indicated "Super fast charging", complete with the blue charging ring, but never actually took advantage of the wattage.

We are almost certain we got a defective unit, which should not be your experience. We expect the Galaxy A06 to have charging speeds similar to that of the Galaxy A05s. It should be able to go from dead to about 25% in fifteen minutes, 43% in thirty minutes, and a full charge should take around 1:30 hours.

Speakers - loudness and quality

The Galaxy A06 has a single bottom-firing speaker. That's quite understandable for a budget phone. That being said, other phones in this price bracket, like last year's Galaxy A25 or the Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 4G, offer stereo speakers on a budget.

Samsung Galaxy A06 review

The speaker on the Galaxy A06 isn't particularly impressive either. It produces a decent volume, though it is only enough for a good score in our ranking. Mids come out sounding well enough with clear dialogue, which is great. Highs can easily get distorted especially at higher volume levels, and there is practically no bass.

Samsung has still thrown in some more advanced audio features, like Dolby Atmos and Bluetooth's nifty separate app sound feature.

Use the Playback controls to listen to the phone sample recordings (best use headphones). We measure the average loudness of the speakers in LUFS. A lower absolute value means a louder sound. A look at the frequency response chart will tell you how far off the ideal "0db" flat line is the reproduction of the bass, treble, and mid frequencies. You can add more phones to compare how they differ. The scores and ratings are not comparable with our older loudspeaker test. Learn more about how we test here.

Connectivity

The Galaxy A06 is a dual nano-SIM device. At least our review unit is. The phone does exist in a single-SIM variant in some markets, so check it carefully. You only get LTE connectivity with the Galaxy A06, with no 5G support. There is no eSIM support either.

Samsung Galaxy A06 review

The Galaxy A06 supports GPS, GLONASS, GALILEO and BDS for location. Local connectivity is covered by dual-band Wi-Fi 5/ac and Bluetooth 5.2 with LE support. There is no NFC, which is kind of unfortunate. The Galaxy A06 has a 3.5mm audio jack, which is great. It also has an FM radio receiver.

The Galaxy A06 has a basic Type-C port backed up by a basic USB 2.0 data connection. That means a maximum theoretical transfer speed of 480 Mbps. There is no video output support or anything fancy, but you do get OTG/USB Host support.

The Galaxy A06 has a pretty sparse set of sensors, but the basics are still covered. There is a stk83xx accelerometer and a stk3a5x light and proximity combo. The proximity sensor seems to be an actual hardware, not a virtual one, which is great to see on such a budget device. There is no magnetometer, no compass, no gyroscope and no barometer.

Reader comments

  • Anonymous
  • 23 Oct 2024
  • y6V

You’ve lived under a rock for 5 years. Pls come out and explore.

  • YourHelper
  • 23 Oct 2024
  • y6V

Yes, it must have that feature for this necessity, it should be available on this phone as well.

  • Anonymous
  • 15 Oct 2024
  • 0Uc

You should be able to access it from Quick Toggle menu by swiping down. Also, it's possible for Camera app to have auto-scan QR codes option. Ultimately, there are third-party apps you can install from Play Store.