Samsung Galaxy A21s

SCORE

PRICE £149 (£179 inc VAT) from johnlewis.com

The Galaxy A21s is made of plastic, but this is still a striking phone: our black review sample included an iridescent oil-slick finish that’s shared by its white and blue siblings. A slightly curved rear and sleek dimensions only add to its appeal, while the fingerprint sensor is well placed for quickly unlocking the phone and authorising contactless payments. The 13-megapixel selfie camera, hidden in a hole-punch notch in the top-left corner of the screen, also allows for face unlocks.

More practicality comes from a 3.5mm audio jack on the bottom edge, with a shared nano-SIM and microSD tray on the left; this takes cards up to 512GB to boost its 32GB of storage. Samsung’s Exynos 980 chipset, backed by 3GB of RAM, could only produce scores of 183 and 1,096 in Geekbench 5, but the Galaxy A21s rarely felt unresponsive or sluggish. The lower-res screen helps boost its gaming performance too, and I didn’t notice any issues in undemanding games such as Stardew Valley. What’s more, it lasted a stunning 22hrs 48mins in our batt ery test.

To save money, the Galaxy A21s uses a Plane to Line Switching (PLS) display with a low resolution of 720 x 1,600. While Samsung claims PLS is of similar quality to IPS, our testing suggests otherwise: it covered 73% of the sRGB colour gamut, with a total volume of only 84% and a measured Delta E of 4.23. Some colours, such as light green and dark red tones, looked particularly dull. Still, it has a peak brightness of 553cd/m² and a 1,267:1 contra st ratio, and its viewing angles are fine.

The quad-camera array consists of a main 48-megapixel (f/2.0) lens, supported by an 8-megapixel (f/2.2) wide-angle unit, 2-megapixel (f/2.4) macro camera and a depth sensor. It takes 12-megapixel images by default – the 48-megapixel option is in Pro mode – but both settings produced detail-rich images with plenty of vibrancy. Just don’t expect top-notch videos, with a maximum 30fps in Full HD and no image stabilisation.

Still, the Galaxy A21s is a fashionable choice for buyers who don’t want to spend a huge sum.

KEY SPECS Octa-core 2GHz/2GHz Exynos 850 3GB RAM 32GB storage 6.5in 720 x 1,600 PLS display 48/8/2/2-megapixel rear camera 802.11ac Bluetooth 5 5,000mAh battery 75 x 8.9 x 164mm (WDH) 192g