JOIN USSamsung Galaxy A52s 5G review: Feature-rich slim phone
Recently, Samsung launched the new premium mid-range phone Galaxy A52s 5G in India.
It comes in two variants-- 6GB RAM + 128GB storage and 8GB RAM + 128GB storage-- for Rs 35,999 and Rs 37,499, respectively.
On paper, it has a good set of hardware including a reliable Qualcomm chipset, quad-camera module, and also a decent battery capacity of 4,500mAh. Even design-wise too, it looks good. But, does it deliver the goods? Let's check it out.
Design, build quality and display
As I said in my first impression article, Samsung borrows the beautiful design language of the original A52 4G-LTE model for the new 5G model.
The Galaxy A52s flaunts a slim body profile with a smooth shell on the back. Our review unit - 'Awesome White' model comes with a gorgeous frosted glass finish and it blends beautifully with the chromium rails around the edge. Also, most importantly, the shell repels fingerprint smudges.
Besides the Awesome White, Samsung also offers two other colour options--Awesome Black, and Awesome Violet.
On the back, you will find curved rectangular capsule housing four camera sensors in the top left corner. It sits finely on the back and doesn't protrude much. When placed on the flat table, the phone doesn't wobble and also slips into the pocket without much fuss.
On the front, it sports a 6.5-inch full HD+ (1080×2400p) super AMOLED screen with an Infinity-O display design. It is protected by Gorilla Glass 5 shield. This prevents scratches on the display from keys or any articles when kept in the pocket.
Like the other premium phones in its class, the Galaxy A52s also supports a 120Hz high refresh rate and offers up to 800 nits brightness. I had a delightful time watching movies and playing games on the device.
Also, the web browsing on the screen is buttery smooth. The Galaxy A52s boasts -- Eye Comfort Shield-- feature that controls the blue light from the screen. This reduces harm to the eyes while reading or watching multimedia content during night times.
It also features an in-display fingerprint sensor and hybrid dual-SIM slots (nano SIM-1 + nano SIM-2 or microSD card). The biometric sensor works fast and is also reliable in terms of recognising the finger impression and unlock the screen.
Performance
Samsung Galaxy A52s houses 6nm class Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G octa-core (4 x 2.4 GHz Kryo 670 + 4 x 1.9 GHz Kryo 670) chipset backed by Adreno 642L graphics engine. It does a good job in performing day-to-day tasks such as app loading, operating camera, browsing the web smoothly without any fuss. Even while playing graphics-rich games such as Asphalt 9: Legends, it works with no hint of lag-ness and there is no serious issue of over-heating.
On Geekbench 5.0 performance benchmarking app, the Galaxy A52s scored 748 and 2,635 points on single-core and multi-core tests, respectively.
The new phone runs Android 11-based One UI 3.1. Except for the ads on the notification, I have no issues with the interface. It looks clean and also really happy that Samsung has assured to offer three years of Android OS software on par with the premium Galaxy phone models.
It comes with a 4,500mAh cell. During the testing, the Galaxy A52s consistently offered a full-day battery life with more than 20 per cent to spare by the end of the day.
The device's retail box comes with a 25W charger. It takes around one and half hours to fully charge the phone from zero to 100 per cent.
The Snapdragon 778G comes integrated with Snapdragon X53 5G Modem-RF System. The Galaxy A52s is one of few phones in the market to support 12 5G bands-- N1, N3, N5, N7, N8, N20, N28, N38, N40, N41, N66, and N78.
With this, the phone, whenever the 5G infrastructure gets ready in India, will be able to support up to 3.7 Gbps download speed and 2.9Gbps upload speed.
Photography:
Samsung's new phones come with a feature-rich quad-camera module-- 64 MP wide sensor (f/1.8, 26mm (wide) lens, 1/1.7-inch, 0.8µm, PDAF: Phase Detection Auto Focus, OIS: Optical Image Stabilisation) + 12MP ultrawide (f/2.2, 123-degree field-of-view, 1.12µm) + 5MP macro (f/2.4) + 5MP depth (f/2.4) sensor with LED flash.
The Galaxy A52s captures really good pictures in the broad daylight. The pictures contain a great amount of details and the colours, though are a bit warmer than natural, they still look pretty to the eyes.
The wide-angle (123-degree) shots too are good. It covers a lot of areas within the frame. The Galaxy A52s also excels with close-up macro shots.
In low-lit conditions, night mode gets you great pictures. You can also take normal images with just the LED flash on in the night and as you can see in the sample below, it looks good.
The Galaxy A52s is also capable of recording videos up to 4K at 30 fps (frames per second) and full HD 1080p at 30 & 60 fps as well. Thanks to gyro-sensor-assisted EIS (Electronic Image Stabilisation) get you stable videos even with shaky hands.
On the front, it features a 32 MP wide sensor (with f/2.2, 26mm lens, 1/2.8-inch, 0.8µm pixel size). It supports HDR and can record videos up to 4K at 30 fps (frames per second) and full HD 1080p at 30 fps.
Final thoughts:
Samsung's new Galaxy A52s is a feature-rich mid-range phone. It has premium build quality, gorgeous slim design with matte finish, offers a full-day battery life, and a reliable Qualcomm chipset, which promises to serve you long.
With the support for 12 5G bands, this phone is future-ready and whenever the necessary cellular infrastructure gets ready in India, the Galaxy A52s owners will certainly be able to enjoy high-speed internet compared to other 5G-based phone users.
As the Indian government has not opened 5G spectrum auctions yet and there is a scarcity of information on what range of band frequencies, they will be allocated to the telecom firms.
Most of the rival branded phones in the market have support for limited 5G bands some have as low as just two. However, the Galaxy A52s has an edge over others in this aspect.
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