Samsung Galaxy J5
More phone for your money
Samsung’s current headline-grabber is the £869 Galaxy Note 8, which it promises won’t catch fire this time. But we’re much more interested in the humble Galaxy J5. Launched in 2015 as a budget option across Asia, it reached the UK early last year (see our review, Issue 475) and impressed us with its excellent screen and long battery life. Its downsides? It had just 8GB of storage, a pretty poor camera, and didn’t come with the latest version of Android.
This update fixes all those problems, and more. The new matt metal back, with its discreet stripes, is reminiscent of the iphone 6, and likewise the home button on the front incorporates a fingerprint sensor supporting contactless payment. A redesigned rear camera sits flush with the case. The screen is 5.2in and feels good – neither too small for older eyes nor too large for smaller hands, and at 720p HD it’s just sharp enough to avoid looking cheap. More importantly, Samsung’s AMOLED technology gives it almost perfect colours, even if it lacks the brightness of higher-end Galaxy models.
Inside, a new processor brought 50 per cent higher scores in our speed tests, beating the sadly short-lived Lenovo P2 (see Issue 498) and putting the J5 in the top rank for its price bracket.
Let’s pause here to consider what this price bracket normally offers. The previous model was selling for under £140 when we tested it. As the pound fell, this drifted up to around £180. This model’s actual asking price is £240 (before the current discount), which lifts it above the likes of the £180 Motorola Moto G5 (see Issue 500) and alongside the Honor 6X (£220 from Appliances Direct www.snipca. com/25818, see Issue 495), with its 32GB of storage and Full HD screen. The 6X’s screen-colour quality is dubious, but it’s much brighter.
Nor can Samsung match Huawei’s dual camera, but we found the J5’s improved lens took very decent 13-megapixel pictures. And battery life remains its big selling point, lasting 18 hours 30 minutes in our video-playback test. This is seven hours more than the 6X or Vodafone’s slower Smart V8 (£159, see Issue 510). The Moto G5 lasted two hours longer than those, but its performance and camera are lacklustre, and the superior G5 Plus is much pricier. That leaves the Galaxy J5 looking attractively priced.
An excellent phone that won’t run out of juice before you do