Overview Of The Samsung Galaxy A5 (2018)

The 2017 Galaxy A5 is the third phone Samsung has produced with exactly this name. It first appeared at the very end of 2014 and Samsung has updated and tweaked the style for each new model. Each year the phone has classed-up its act a little, leading to this 2017 version, which you could easily mistake for a top-end phone. Dig deep enough into the hardware and you’ll find a few parts that would make the Samsung Galaxy A5 a swindle if it cost as much as the Galaxy S7, though. But they’re not the sort of things most people will notice every day. If you’re not obsessed with having the latest and greatest tech in your phone, you’ll probably love the Samsung Galaxy A5. And saving a few hundred dollars or pounds in the bargain is an attractive sweetener. The main group that might be put off is the bargain hunter crowd. The OnePlus 3T is a more powerful phone, and has a lot more storage too, but is only $40/£30 (around AU$50) extra. Motorola’s Moto G4 Plus is also a much better deal in the “tech per dollar” stakes. As usual, Samsung charges what it can for the Galaxy A5, rather than trying to squeeze in as much as possible. Not everyone quibbles about every pound/dollar as much as we do, though, and for the most part, the Samsung Galaxy A5 is a joy to use. The screen’s great, the battery life commendable, the size of the little guy accessible, and while the power on tap isn’t all that impressive, there’s enough to stop the phone seeming underpowered. The Samsung Galaxy A5 shows you quite how expensive “mid-range” phones can be nowadays. It launched at $399 in the US, £369 in the UK and AU$649 in Australia. That’s a chunk more expensive than the 2016 version of the Galaxy A5, but the phone comes with a few important feature upgrades too, like water resistance. However, the good news is more recently it has witnessed a price drop, bringing the Galaxy A5 price down to around $320, £280 SIM-free. The 2017 Galaxy A5 launched in January 2017, a year after the 2016 Galaxy A5 appeared. Much like the Galaxy S series, the mid-range A phones have started to appear annually, and more reliable than the average train. Just look at the spec list of the Samsung Galaxy A5 and it may seem to have more features than last year’s Samsung flagship, the Galaxy S7. It has more megapixels, with 16 squeezed into both the front and rear cameras and a new-style USB-C socket. It’s also a classic example of why it pays to know a little more about the tech behind the figures, though. The Samsung Galaxy A5 has a distinctly mid-range chipset, the Samsung Exynos 7880. It’s reasonably close in power to the Snapdragon 617 used in phones like the Moto G4 Plus, even though the A5 is twice the price. Where the Galaxy A5 excels is in making this conventional hardware work well. For example, the camera is very quick, with the same almost lag-free experience as seen in Samsung’s most expensive phones. And that performance is combined with a typically high-quality Full HD Super AMOLED display. Tech obsessives can do better, but those who simply want a ‘nice’ phone that seems like a fairly high-end piece of hardware will appreciate the A5’s style. The Galaxy A5 also has a comfortable 32GB of storage, and a microSD card slot to let you add it (with cards of up to 256GB). The Samsung Galaxy A5, this phone is made of metal and glass. The front and back are glass, the sides aluminium with a colour-matched finish. Samsung describes the design as “uniform all round”, and that’s on the money. The rear glass curves into the metal sides for a smoother feel too. The Samsung Galaxy A5 has separate light-up soft keys below the screen, but they’re flipped around: ‘back’ on the right, ‘recent apps’ on the left. The Samsung Galaxy A5 is supposed to have a noticeably mid-range chipset,  the Samsung Exynos 7880 which is seriously on par to the power possessed by Snapdragon 617 used in phones like the Moto G4 Plus. The area where the Samsung Galaxy A5 excels is in making this conventional hardware work well. For example, the camera is very quick, with the same almost lag-free experience as seen in Samsung’s most expensive phones. And that performance is combined with a typically high-quality Full HD Super AMOLED display. The Galaxy A5 also has a comfortable 32GB of storage, and a microSD card slot to let you add it (with cards of up to 256GB). The Samsung Galaxy A5, this phone is made of metal and glass. The front and back are glass, the sides aluminium with a colour-matched finish. Samsung describes the design as “uniform all round”, and that’s on the money. The rear glass curves into the metal sides for a smoother feel too. The Samsung Galaxy A5 has separate light-up soft keys below the screen, but they’re flipped around: ‘back’ on the right, ‘recent apps’ on the left.