Are you curious about the Samsung A20 smartphone? Read this Samsung A20 review to discover all you need to know about this smartphone.
Samsung A20: At First Glance
In its mission at providing budget smartphones that appeal to customers with low budgets, Samsung introduced the A-series. 2019 was a good year for the A-series, as Samsung ceaselessly populated the market with several releases.
We have seen the entry-level edition of the series – the Samsung Galaxy A10. Although there are several releases into the series, in this review, we will get to discuss the second edition – Samsung Galaxy A20.
Like I hinted in the previous section, the Samsung Galaxy A20 is affordable. Specifically, at the time of writing this review – September 2021 – the Samsung Galaxy A20 cost $126.99.
Having reviewed the price of the Samsung Galaxy A20, let us proceed into a detailed discussion of its features and specs.
Samsung A20: Design, Dimension and Weight
Despite being a budget smartphone, the Samsung A20 manages to look sleek and appealing until you get down to using it. The chassis is made of plastic which is not unheard of among smartphones in this price range.
The back of the phone is made of a glossy polycarbonate finish giving it a façade of a glass build. However, this illusion doesn’t take long to be disproved as it is prone to scratches and nicks.
More displeasing is that the glossy back casing is susceptible to fingerprints and blemishes as well. Hence, if you will like to maintain the glossy back casing, it is advisable to use a protective case as soon as you unbox this phone.
On a brighter note, the back view of the Samsung A20 looks good with its curved out edges which accentuates the glossy finish into a 3D effect.
Also, the back chassis houses a vertical notch dual-camera module by the top-left corner and the LED flash right below it.
At the center of the back chassis, but rather too close to the top, you will find the fingerprint sensor. There is also a Samsung branding below the fingerprint sensor.
Moving on, the bottom edge of the Samsung A20 houses a 3.5 mm headphone jack, a microphone, and speakers. There is also a USB Type-C port for data transfer and charging the phone.
The top edge features another microphone while the left edge features a card tray for the SIM and SD card. Meanwhile, the right edge features the volume rocker and a power button.
Moving on to the display, the Samsung A20 features a bezel-less display. Since the Samsung A20 has no top bezel, there is a u-cut notch that houses the front camera.
Also, since there isn’t a bottom bezel as well, the bottom control keys are on-screen.
For color options, Samsung A20 is available in three colors, namely black, red and blue. Hence, users can choose a color that meets their personality.
When it comes to the size and weight of the Samsung A20, it weighs 169 g. Likewise, it measures 158.4 x 74.7 x 7.8 mm.
The Samsung A20 size might look a bit daunting in prints, however, while holding it in the hands it doesn’t feel so heavy. Moreover, you can comfortably hold it with one hand.
In summary, the Samsung A20 looks attractive at least until its plastic chassis starts to wear out from scratches and blemishes. Moreover, plastic is a less durable material but giving the price of this phone we can only remain contented.
In conclusion, I will rate the Samsung A20 an eight in this design and dimension review section.
Samsung A20: Display Features
The Samsung A20 has a 6.4-inch super AMOLED display with an HD+ resolution of 1560 x 720 pixels. The display resolution is low especially for an AMOLED display – a 4K resolution screen would have been more suitable.
However, the Samsung A20 is a budget phone and our expectations should be limited.
Speaking of super AMOLED, it is a display technology that makes the touchscreen respond better – consequently offering an improved user experience. It works by integrating the touchscreen layer into the screen itself.
Super AMOLED is unlike conventional touchscreens display that has a layer on top of the screen that recognizes touch. Overall, the AMOLED screen offers excellent contrast and a fair amount of sharpness.
Nonetheless, the color reproduction of the screen is impressive. Interestingly, it covers 100% of the sRGB color space which implies that it supports the widest range of color accuracy.
Additionally, the screen brightness is solid at about 465 nits. Therefore, it is possible to use the Samsung A20 outdoor on a sunny afternoon without straining your eyes.
The Samsung A20 also supports a dark-mode setting that makes the screen less straining to the eyes at night.
The bezel-less screen stretches from edge to edge with an aspect ratio of 19.5:9. Its wide viewing angle makes watching videos at fullscreen a very enjoyable experience.
Furthermore, with a pixel density of 268 PPI (pixels per inch), the Samsung A20’s PPI is below the 300 PPI industry-standard quality. However, you will get fairly quality images and texts.
As a protective layer on the screen, the Samsung A20 features Corning gorilla glass. This is to ensure that scratches and cracks on the screen are kept minimal.
In conclusion, the Samsung A20 display impresses mostly despite being a budget smartphone. Hence, I will rate the Samsung A20 a nine in this display features review.
Samsung A20: Camera Features
The Samsung A20 features an 8 MP front camera with a ƒ/2.0 aperture. Not to worry about the terminologies, this implies that the front camera produces detailed and realistic images.
Meanwhile, the back dual-camera features a 13 MP lens with a ƒ/1.9 aperture. It also holds a secondary 5 MP wide-angle shooter with a ƒ/2.2 aperture.
The wide-angle camera is useful for zooming out and taking a wide dynamic range of landscape shots. The camera helps to produce adequately exposed images due to its wide dynamic range.
In portrait mode, the Samsung A20’s performance is impressive thanks to the live focus feature and the shallow depth of field of its cameras. The live focus feature enables the camera to focus quickly on the subject while the background may get distorted or blurry.
Speaking of the live focus, the cameras easily locks the focus quickly in outdoor shots. However, the live focus for capturing images in low light tends to be finicky.
Additionally, the live focus feature is advantageous in getting rid of distracting backgrounds in portraits. Also, it helps to direct the viewer’s attention to the subject only.
The Samsung A20 manages to take detailed and color punchy images in good lighting conditions. However, low-light images are plagued by some noise that gets a bit distracting.
Overall, the dual-camera of the Samsung A20 is better than most budget single-camera smartphones.
In conclusion, the camera performance of the Samsung A20 is not the best you can get from a smartphone. However, its performance is better than most competitors in this price range.
Hence, I will rate the Samsung A20 a seven in this camera features review section.
Samsung A20: Battery Life and Talk Time
The Samsung A20 boasts a 4000 mAh, non-removable battery. We consider a phone with a non-removable battery a disadvantage because if the battery stops working you cannot easily replace it.
On a brighter note, according to Samsung’s advertised information, the Samsung A20 will typically last up to 26 hours of 3G talk time. As a prove or disprove of Samsung’s claim, I carried out a battery test.
The battery test requires putting the battery to a full charge then surfing the web continuously over an LTE network. Consequently, the Samsung A20 lasted 13 hours 46 minutes.
This battery performance is quite impressive although it is below Samsung’s claim. Understandably, our test was more rigorous using the LTE network rather than the 3G network advertised.
As a basis of comparison, the Samsung A20 battery life exceeds the average 10 hours battery life of most smartphones. Specifically, the Samsung A20 supersedes the more expensive Nokia 7.1 which lasted 7 hours 42 minutes in the same test.
When it comes to charging the Samsung A20, the 1.5 watts bundled charger supports fast charging. This implies that you can top up the battery power in no time.
Practically, it takes less than 2 hours to completely charge the battery.
In summary, the battery department is one place that the Samsung A20 impresses clearly. Moreover, its fast charging ability gives it an advantage over similar budget smartphones.
Therefore, I will rate the Samsung A20 a nine in this battery review.
Samsung A20: Storage Options and Performance
In this section of this review, I will be going into the storage options of the Samsung A20. The storage option is as equally important as other specs of a smartphone.
On the storage front, the Samsung A20 comes with 32 GB internal storage which is disappointing by modern standards. Even more disappointing is the fact that only about 20 GB out of the 32 GB is used for storing apps and photos.
The remaining 12 GB is dedicated to the OS and pre-installed apps. However, Samsung compensates for this storage limitation by offering a microSD card that supports up to 512 GB of storage expansion.
Finally, I will rate the Samsung A20 a seven in this storage review section.
Samsung A20: Security Features and Sensors
Have you ever wondered how the term smartphone came about? The transition of mobile phones from the era of feature phones to smartphones is made possible by sensors.
Sensors are the intelligence behind the smartness of these phones. They are used to detect user’s actions or changes in the environment.
When these actions or changes occur, the sensor detects it snd sends the information to the processor. The processor then responds accordingly.
In respect to this review, the Samsung A20 is equipped with quite a number of sensors. These sensors include a fingerprint sensor, Accelerometer, Gyro Sensor, Geomagnetic Sensor, Hall Sensor, and Proximity Sensor.
The Fingerprint sensor helps with biometric authentication that helps you securely log in to your phone. It works by registering your fingerprint using capacitive scanning.
The other biometric authentication supported by the Samsung A20 is the face-reader and manual pattern. Therefore, you can use any of these methods to unlock and log in to your phone.
The accelerometer is useful for showing your current driving speed and switching your apps from portrait to landscape. It works by detecting axis-based motions and registering them.
Meanwhile, the Gyro sensors are used for detecting changes in screen orientation. They are applicable in motion sensing games and tilting mechanisms.
The Geomagnetic sensor on the other hand detects a magnetic field. The geomagnetic sensor is useful for compass functionality.
Hall sensor uses the hall effect to detect the presence and magnitude of magnetic fields. It can be used to detect the closeness of a magnetic case in order to automatically turn off the screen when the case is closed.
Moving on to the Proximity sensor, it detects the closeness of other objects to your phone without physical contact. This is applicable when you put your phone close to your ears to receive a call – the proximity sensor detects this and turns off the backlight to conserve power and disable the touchscreen.
In conclusion, the Samsung A20 has an impressive collection of useful sensors. Hence, I will rate the Samsung A20 an eight in this review section.
Conclusion
The Samsung A20 is a low-budget smartphone and as expected, there are few tradeoffs. For instance, the build quality is poor, making its plastic chassis prone to scratches.
Also, the display quality is not so impressive and its performance is lagging as well. However, it has its good sides too.
For example, it features an outstanding battery performance. Additionally, the camera’s performance is great, most impressive is its live focus feature.
Finally, I will recommend the Samsung A20 to people who are looking forward to owning a budget phone without concern for its performance lag.
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