Samsung Galaxy A23 review

Competition

The mid-range segment has some cutthroat competition. OEMs try to offer a larger set of features at a low price and within small profit margins. Samsung's attempts to disrupt the said segment are rather successful as most of the Galaxy A phones are competitive and have the edge over some of its rivals, usually when it comes to display and camera quality.

Unfortunately, the Galaxy A23 doesn't fit the formula. We struggled to find it in some of the biggest markets. Still, the handset lands at around €270-280, while in India, it's a little lower at INR 18,500.

Samsung Galaxy A52s 5G • Xiaomi Poco X4 Pro 5G • Realme 9 Pro

Let's begin with some in-house competition. For about €280, Samsung is willing to sell you the Galaxy A52s 5G, as long as you can find it on shelves, which is not very hard, at least for now. Anyway, the Galaxy A52s 5G is a better phone in pretty much every way - faster processor, brighter and better OLED screen, better camera performance all around, faster charging (with the provided charger), comparable battery life, it's water-proof and has stereo speakers. It might be an older phone released in September last year, but it deserves your hard-earned money more than the A23.

Next, we have the Xiaomi Poco X4 Pro 5G. The device is a direct competitor to the A23 (price-wise, that is) both in India and Europe. And just like the A52s, it offers much better value overall with a far superior 120Hz OLED display, performance, charging and build. Strangely enough, the A23 offers about the same camera performance in daylight and both phones skip 4K video recording.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 11 Pro 5G • Xiaomi Redmi Note 11 Pro

The Realme 9 Pro is right up the Galaxy A23's alley in terms of features and price as well. The device settles for an LCD panel, too, albeit being much brighter, faster charging, and arguably better camera performance. Battery life, on the other hand, is a tad longer on the 9 Pro and the Snapdragon 695 delivers better performance, especially in the GPU department.

Lastly, we have the Xiaomi Redmi Note 11 Pro 5G priced at around €260 in Europe or the Redmi Note 11 Pro in India. The latter makes it a bit hard to recommend given the sub-optimal and old MediaTek Helio G96 SoC, but the rest of the feature set makes it a viable option over the Galaxy A23. The Redmi Note 11 Pro 5G, on the other hand, is a much more capable device for the European market bringing a better screen, faster chipset, stereo loudspeakers, comparable battery life, faster charging and somewhat better build.

Verdict

It's quite apparent that the Galaxy A23 isn't priced right. It has many competitors that are better equipped for the job, even ones that are a bit older - from last year. Even some home-grown competition is at hand. Sure, the Galaxy A23 snaps some pretty good photos during the day, and battery life is dependable, but that's not nearly enough to make it desirable.

The display uses an IPS panel without an ambient light sensor, making things worse, the charging solution isn't competitive, the chipset drags behind most of the competition in terms of raw performance, the software is laggy, and the ultrawide camera is surprisingly even more underwhelming than initially expected.

Perhaps within a couple of months or a year, the Galaxy A23 may become a bit more competitive, but with its current pricing, there are better options out there, that's for sure.

Pros

• Excellent battery life.
• Highly customizable One UI 4.1, ships with Android 12.
• Good main camera performance.

Cons

• Lacks ambient and proximity sensor.
• Mediocre screen quality.
• Slow and laggy software.
• Slow charging with the provided charger.
• Ultrawide and macro cameras have poor performance.