When I first took Samsung’s new affordability-minded Galaxy A55 5G smartphone out of my bag, it caught the eye of one of my colleagues who said, “That’s actually a really good-looking phone.” Another then chimed in, “Yeah, that’s because it looks like an iPhone.” While I’m not inclined to argue—and I’d expect nothing less from devotees of the House of Jobs—the fact that Samsung can produce a new device that’s packed with features, elegantly constructed, eminently affordable, and elicits such a comparison from a die-hard iPhone user should be seen as a pretty big win.
While Samsung has long been known for its premium smartphones—high-end specs with prices to match—the A55 5G shows that you don’t need to spend in excess of AUD$2,000 to enjoy a polished and feature-heavy smartphone experience. In fact, you don’t even need to AUD$1,000 as the A55 5G has an RRP of just AUD$699. You get quite a lot of bang for your buck at that price point, making it an easy-to-recommend option for those feeling the pinch in this cost-of-living crisis, or for anyone prone to losing, breaking, or otherwise mishandling their smartphone.
Note: For context, I’ve been using the Galaxy S24 Ultra as my primary phone for the last few months, so I’ll be using that as a point of comparison throughout this review to better illustrate how the A55 5G holds up to a smartphone with a starting RRP of AUD$2,199.
Table of Contents
Build and Screen
The first thing you notice when you pick up the A55 5G is how premium it feels in the hand. This is not a case of deploying plastic in its construction with a “that’ll do” attitude, which is what you would realistically have expected from this price bracket in the past. The A55 is sculpted from aluminium and Gorilla Glass and feels every bit like a smartphone of at least twice its asking price, while its 213g weight gives it a reassuring heft that matches its tactile strengths.
Housed within this casing is a 6.6-inch Super AMOLED display with 1080 x 2340 resolution, which is crisp and clear. Watching YouTube or your streaming service of choice is always slick, and while the A55 boasts a thicker bezel and rounded screen corners when compared with the Samsung’s Galaxy S24 Ultra, it has a charm that makes it feel somehow more approachable — “friendlier” comes to mind.
The A55 also boasts Samsung’s Vision Booster functionality, which helps to manage brightness and maximise outdoor visibility. I found this absolutely served its purpose in almost all conditions with the only exception being at the beach on a blazing hot day — the combination of the sun beating down and the blinding white sand made it difficult to see the screen. Saying that, any phone would struggle under similar conditions, and when comparing the A55 to the S24 Ultra with the brightness cranked on both, to my eyes the A55 actually looks a little brighter.
The screen is noticeably less snappy than the S24 Ultra’s when moving between apps and unlocking the phone, despite both boasting a 120Hz refresh rate. This probably has more to do with the animated transitions than the screen itself, as everything feels a touch slower and more jagged, as if there are frames missing within the animations. Fortunately, this is fairly subtle and also not the case while using any particular app — any time spent in-app is smooth sailing all the way.
More: Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra Review: A Polished, Premium, AI-Powered Masterclass
Camera
The A55 features four cameras (amounting to about AUD$175 per lens), with a 32MP selfie lens on the front and a 12MP ultra-wide, 50MP wide-angle, and 5MP macro lens on the rear. While there’s nothing particularly new here, overall the package impresses at this price point and will be more than enough for the average user. I admit it’s fun to have features like the S24 Ultra’s 100x digital zoom at your disposal, but the reality is that’s something you rarely reach for and the A55’s 10x digital zoom does a commendable job in most circumstances.
While occasionally the A55’s images can seem a little washed out to my eyes, particularly on a bleary grey day, this is easily overcome with a few seconds of post-snap editing. Plus, even though it doesn’t have shooting options like Expert Raw—meaning it’s probably not going to be the phone camera of choice for any professional photographers out there—it does have a Fun mode, which gives direct access to a range of playful Snapchat filters, making it an ideal choice for kids.
The phone also packs Samsung’s Nightography functionality, which is designed to deliver better performance under low-light conditions. This turned out to be a mixed bag, but the results were impressive as often as they weren’t. Much of what makes this functionality work is the way the image is processed after it’s been taken and despite there being times I had to take photos again because they didn’t come out as I’d hoped, the A55’s post-snap processing is less boisterous than the S24 Ultra’s, and can produce results that I actually prefer.
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Battery Life and Charging
When it comes to longevity, the A55 5G’s 5,000mAh battery offers more than enough juice to get you comfortably through the day, meaning you don’t have to nervously eye on your handset’s power level as the evening comes on or give it a quick charge before heading out for the night. Even using it consistently throughout the day, by 6pm I invariably had at least 40 per cent of battery life left and that’s without activating Power Saving mode — the 45 per cent visible in the accompanying snaps here follow a night of no charge at all.
However, those who’ve grown accustomed to wireless charging might bump up against the A55’s lack of it. You’ll need to use a cable to recharge this device, and with support for a 25W charger (wall plug sold separately) you can expect to go from completely empty to 100 per cent in around 90 minutes. This is neither impressively fast, nor is it particularly slow. It’s a perfectly adequate charging experience at this price point.
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Final Verdict
While the A55 5G won’t blow the socks off anyone who’s grown familiar with Samsung’s top-of-the-line smartphones, it’s a very attractive proposition for those who don’t really need that kind of uber-premium smartphone experience. I’d argue that accounts for the vast majority of people, whether they’re inclined to admit it or not.
I’d also make the case that the A55 offers an experience that’s far closer to the S24 range than its one-third price point would suggest. While it doesn’t offer any of the Galaxy AI functionality launched with the S24—yet, although I wouldn’t be surprised if this rolls out with a future software update—when it comes to the screen, camera, build quality, and battery life, it has just about everything you could want. And for just AUD$699 it feels like a bit of a steal.
DISCLAIMER: The author of this article, Rob Edwards, was provided the Samsung Galaxy A55 5G for the purposes of this review.
