samsung galaxy A51 review

Hands on: Samsung Galaxy A51 review

Mixing top features with an attractive price

EARLY VERDICT

If you're after a smartphone with a big screen, big battery and plenty of photography features, but don't want to break the bank, the Samsung Galaxy A51 could well be the phone for you.

FOR      

• Big screen and battery
• 4 rear cameras

AGAINST

• Not water resistant
• No wireless charging

The Samsung Galaxy A51 is an affordable mid-range handset with a few features borrowed from the firm's flagship range.
You get a big screen, a dearth of cameras and a sizable battery, which when paired with an achievable price tag ensures the Galaxy A51 makes a positive first impression.

We got hands-on with the Samsung Galaxy A51 during CES 2020, where it debut alongside the Galaxy A71, to see if it can live up to the spec sheet.

Samsung Galaxy A51 Design and display

No other brand rolls out iterative updates quite like Samsung, and in the last five years it has managed to turn iteration into an art form. The Galaxy A51 takes a lot of cues from the A50s, which in turn was based on the A50. So essentially, a lot of the internal hardware that you get in the A51 is over a year old at this point.
But that doesn't mean there are no new features on the A51. Let's start with the back: the A51 has two diagonal lines across its surface that break up the design — just like the A50s — but this time there's a gradient effect that shows up when light hits the surface. That gradient effect is the basis for the device's colors, with the A51 available in Prism Crush Black, Prism Crush Blue, and Prism Crush White.

With a vibrant design and Infinity-O cutout, the Galaxy A51 is one of the best-looking phones Samsung has released.

The lower quadrants also feature subtle lines that further differentiates the design, and the overall effect is that the A51 is one of the best-looking phones Samsung has released to date. I'm using the blue option, and the vibrant color makes the phone stand out. Like last year, the back is made out of plastic, but the glossy finish gives it a glass-like feel. The best part is that it doesn't smudge as easily as a glass back, and it is more durable.

Another major change at the back is the camera housing. The rectangular camera housing is identical to that of the Galaxy S20 series, and it's clear that Samsung is trying to create a design identity here. While the camera housing is by no means attractive, it is consistent across all of Samsung's 2020 devices.
The major design change at the front is the Infinity-O cutout for the front camera module. Last year's A50 and A50s featured the Infinity-U cutout, and the cutout on the A51 is smaller and better integrated into the design. The bezels are razor-thin this time around, and it makes using the A51 that much more enticing

Rounding out the design, you'll find the power and volume buttons on the right, and the 3.5mm jack, USB-C charging port, and a solitary speaker at the bottom. Samsung has also moved away from the 3.5mm jack on its flagships, so it's good to see the analog jack intact on the A51. The SIM card tray is on the left, and you get the option to slot two SIM cards as well as a MicroSD card. Of course, the variant of the A51 sold in global markets will likely have a single SIM slot.
The Galaxy A51 is astonishingly light at 172g for a phone that has a 4000mAh battery, and it has a great in-hand feel thanks to the subtle curves at the back. With a width of 73.6mm, the phone is also narrow, and while it isn't conducive for one-handed usage, it is on the lower end of the scale as far as phone sizes go in 2020.

The Galaxy A51 has the same AMOLED display as last year's A50, but that's not a bad thing.

Coming to the screen, the Galaxy A51 has a 6.5-inch Super AMOLED display that ticks all the right boxes. Colors are vibrant, you get decent viewing angles, and there weren't any issues while using the screen under harsh sunlight. You get to choose from Natural or Vivid picture modes, and there's no option to manually tweak the color balance of the screen.

But you do a blue light filter that can be customized to run from sunset to sunrise, and you get the other scaling and font sizing options that are standard on all Samsung phones. The screen is protected by a layer of Gorilla Glass 3, another area that's unchanged from last year. That's true for the panel quality itself — other than the switch to an Infinity-O cutout and a minor 0.1-inch increase in screen size, there isn't any difference from the A50 or A50s. That's not necessarily a bad thing though, as the screen holds up just fine in 2020.

Samsung Galaxy A51 Hardware

Samsung has been recycling hardware on its phones for several years, and it's no different on the Galaxy A51. The phone is powered by the Exynos 9611, the same as the A50s. The A50 had the Exynos 9610, and while the Exynos 9611 is marketed as a new chipset, the only difference from the 9610 is that it can facilitate 48MP camera modules. Both the 9610 and 9611 use the same set of cores and the same Mali G72 for visuals, and they're both fabricated on a 10nm node.

Software	One UI 2.0 based on Android 10
Display	6.5-inch (2400x1080) Super AMOLED
Chipset	2.30GHz Exynos 9611
RAM	4GB/6GB/8GB
Storage	64GB/128GB
Rear Camera 1	48MP ƒ/2.0 (primary)
Rear Camera 2	12MP ƒ/2.2 (wide-angle)
Rear Camera 3	5MP ƒ/2.4 (macro)
Rear Camera 4	5MP ƒ/2.2 (portrait)
Front Camera 1	32MP ƒ/2.2
Connectivity	Wi-Fi 802.11 ac, BT5.0, NFC
Battery	4000mAh | 15W
Security	In-screen fingerprint
Colors	Prism Crush Black, Prism Crush White, Prism Crush Blue
Dimensions	158.5 x 73.6 x 7.9mm
Weight	172g

If anything, Samsung is shortchanging buyers on the storage front this year, with the A51 offering UFS 2.0 storage whereas last year's A50 and A50s had UFS 2.1 storage. Let's get back to the hardware, because Samsung's decision to use the Exynos 9611 in the A51 makes things sluggish in day-to-day use. The chipset has four Cortex A73 cores at 2.3GHz and four energy-efficient A53 cores at 1.7GHz, and there's just not enough grunt to handle even basic tasks like web browsing.

You will notice lag at times even while navigating the user interface, with actions like opening the app drawer causing a negligible delay. Then there's the issue of gaming, and the Mali G72 just does not hold up in titles like PUBG and Fortnite. If you're serious about mobile gaming, you're better off picking a phone with a Snapdragon 730 instead. The A51 is barely adequate even for everyday use — you should not be able to see lag when exiting an app to go to the home screen.

The phone is available with 6GB/128GB and 8GB/128GB variants in India, but in other markets Samsung will offer the A51 with a 4GB option. There's a MicroSD slot that can accommodate cards up to 512GB in size, and you also get NFC with Samsung Pay, Bluetooth 5.0 LE, FM radio, and Wi-Fi ac. The optical in-display fingerprint sensor is fast and reliable, and I didn't face any issues with it.

On the connectivity front, the A51 has LTE bands 1/2/3/4/5/7/8/12/17/20/26/28/38/40/41/66. That should be more than adequate to connect to most LTE networks around the world, and with the phone slated to go on sale in global markets, Samsung will tailor LTE bands according to the region.

Yet another area where things are unchanged is battery. The A51 has the same 4000mAh battery with 15W fast charging, and I didn't have any issues with battery longevity. The phone manages to last a day with ease, and although the hardware itself hasn't changed from the A50, I got better battery usage figures on the A51.

Samsung Galaxy A51 Software

One of the highlights of the A51 is that it comes with One UI 2.0 based on Android 10 out of the box. That wasn't always the case with Samsung's budget phones, so it is great to see the manufacturer offer its latest UI on all of its 2020 phones. One UI 2.0 integrates Android 10's system-wide dark mode, and you also get the ability to choose from Android 10's default navigation gestures or Samsung's take.

One UI 2.0 comes with Android 10 and a treasure trove of customization options.

Samsung's gestures include designated zones at the bottom of the screen from where you swipe up. It is an elegant solution, and is easier to get acclimated to if you're switching from the legacy navigation keys. But the fact that you also get Android 10's gestures — with the swipe-in from either side to go back, and swipe up from the bottom of the screen to go to the home screen — makes it that much more enticing.

Samsung has always offered a healthy list of customization features, and it's no different on the A51. You now get Edge screen, with the ability to configure pull-out Edge panels and set up Edge lighting for incoming notifications and calls. Edge lighting makes up for the fact that phones these days don't have an LED notification light, and there's just a lot of customizability to choose from here.

The A51 also has software-based face unlock, and while it isn't as secure as a fingerprint reader, it is fast. Elsewhere, you get the ability to use two instances of an app at once, Bixby, off-screen gestures, Digital Wellbeing controls, and one-handed mode. Samsung made a dedicated effort to modernize its UI in recent years, and the result is that One UI 2.0 feels modern and a far cry from the TouchWiz days.

Samsung Galaxy A51 Camera

The highlight with the Galaxy A51 is the quad camera array at the back: there's now a 48MP primary camera joined by a 12MP wide-angle lens, 5MP macro shooter, and another 5MP lens for portrait mode. You get a 32MP camera up front, which is a minor upgrade from the 25MP shooter on last year's A50.

The camera interface itself should be immediately familiar if you've used a Samsung phone recently. The main shooting modes are laid out in a ribbon at the bottom, and you can edit these as needed based on your preferences. There are toggles for flash, timer, filters and beautify effects, and you can easily switch between the primary lens and wide-angle shooter

The 48MP camera is a known quantity at this point, and it takes great shots in daylight conditions. Resultant images have plenty of detail and decent dynamic range, and you get those saturated colors that define Samsung's cameras. One of the biggest changes Samsung made in 2020 is with the ultra-wide lens, with the shooter managing to produce shots with the same level of detail as the primary lens.

As good as the A51 is in daylight conditions, shots in artificial or low lighting are a blotchy mess. There's far too much noise, colors are washed out, and the final images are just nowhere near good enough for sharing on social platforms.

The macro lens does not have autofocus, and it struggles to dial in on busy subjects, like a watch face. Regardless of what I tried, I could not get it to focus on the watch face of my Promaster Skyhawk, and although the 5MP resolution is higher than what you get with most other phones, the macro lens is still very limited in its usability.

Samsung Galaxy A51