We’re all waiting for the Galaxy S23 to be announced on Unpacked in a few weeks, but the S23 won’t be the first phone Samsung releases in 2023. That honor belongs to the budget-oriented Galaxy A14 5G, which goes on sale today for just $200. It offers some meaningful upgrades over last year’s A13 and gets four years of update support, which is rare even for phones costing several times more.
The phone has slightly larger bezels than more expensive phones, and there’s a teardrop notch for the front camera instead of a less intrusive hole punch. Since the screen is an LCD, you’ll also have a side-mounted fingerprint sensor instead of an in-display fingerprint sensor. On the other hand, the phone still offers a microSD card slot and a headphone jack, two features that are increasingly rare even among budget phones.
Budget phones have suffered from supply chain shortages during the epidemic and have had to turn to lower-cost ARM chips and lower-resolution screens. While the Galaxy A14 doesn’t have a Snapdragon chip, it does come with the powerful MediaTek Dimensity 700. It also features a 6.6-inch 1080 x 2408 LCD touchscreen instead of the 720p panel found on last year’s A13 and most other similarly priced budget phones. It also has a 90Hz refresh rate for smoother animations.
Samsung promises multi-day battery life from the 5000mAh battery, but the 15W maximum charging speed is a bit slow by 2023 standards. However, you don’t have to wait for Android updates right away. While many budget phones are still running Android 12, the A14 comes with Android 13 and the latest One UI interface. In addition, Samsung has promised four years of security patches and two major Android OS updates (Android 14 and 15). That’s what you’d expect from a budget phone, and you’ll probably replace it in four years.
With a budget phone like the A14, one of the things you have to compromise on is the camera. The phone has three lenses on the back, but don’t expect the same results as the triple-lens Galaxy S phone. The main 50MP camera is nothing to sneeze at, but the 2MP macro camera and 2MP depth camera do little to improve your mobile photography experience.
Samsung offers unlocked phones as well as branded phones from all three major carriers. The carriers themselves will sell the phone in their stores, but Samsung is offering an instant trade-in offer. If you own an iPhone or Galaxy from a few years ago, it’s probably $100 cheaper.