The Samsung Galaxy A32 hit the market in 2021. On overall rating, I’d give it a solid 8/10 on the look and feel alone. The phone features some top specs like a 90Hz display, Type C fast charging, and an excellent battery. And there’s more.

The Samsung Galaxy A32 is a prime example of good phones getting cheap, and cheap phones getting good. A few flaws could be a deal breaker, but we will get to them in time. Overall, the price is right, and it looks and feels premium.

Having tested it for a while, here is my in-depth review of the device.

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Prices in Kenya, Variants, Availability

The most available variant of the Samsung Galaxy A32 in Kenya is the 128GB + 8GB RAM combination. They have interesting names for the colors. You get Awesome White, Awesome Black, Awesome Blue, and Awesome Violet color variants. The market price for the A32 is KES 29,999, but you can get it at KES 22,490 from Badili.

Unboxing

Unboxing the Galaxy A32 from Badili gives you:

• Samsung Galaxy A32 device
• 15W Adaptive Fast Charger
• USB Type C cable
• A Thank You note from Badili’s CEO – This comes with a KES 500 discount on you/your friend’s next purchase.
• A 12-month warranty card

Tech Specs and Features Summary

• Weight: 184 g (6.49 oz), Glass front, plastic frame, plastic back
• DISPLAY: Super AMOLED, 90Hz, 6.4 inches, 1080 x 2400 pixels
• OS: Android 11, One UI 3.1, Mediatek Helio G80 (12 nm)
• Storage:
  • Internal 64GB 4GB RAM
  • 4GB RAM 128GB
  • 6GB RAM 128GB
  • 8GB RAM 128GB
• Back Camera Setup:
  • Quad 64 MP
  • 8 MP
  • 5 MP (macro)
  • 5 MP (depth)
• Selfie Camera: Single 20 MP (wide)
• Both cameras: Video 1080p@30fps
• Headphone Jack
• Charging and Battery: Fast charging 15W USB USB Type-C 2.0, 5000 mAh, non-removable
• Fingerprint (under display)
• Colors: Awesome Black, Awesome White, Awesome Blue, Awesome Violet

Samsung Galaxy A32 Design and Build

The Galaxy A32 is thin and light and feels very nice on the hand. The simplicity in design, faded-like flat colors, and lack of gradients on the back make it look and feel like a phone you want to keep looking at. Sometimes designers take too much time on the back of a phone that a user barely sees or covers up with a case. So this simple design brings out the basic feel of a good phone.

You will get a USB-C port, a loudspeaker, a primary mic, a headphone jack at the bottom, and finally, a secondary mic on the top. /The back might become a fingerprint magnet depending on the color you choose. Here, to deal with fingerprint smudges, I recommend the Awesome white or violet variants.

The Camera Setup

Samsung Galaxy A32 has one of the best camera setups in this price range. At first glance, it was weird lacking the camera bump, but the more I look at it, the more it catches my eye. The primary sensor’s full resolution at 64MP gives you okay shots. It does not do too well at night photography, but the Night Mode feature helps deal with the noise.

At the front, a 20MP shooter comes housed in an Infinity-U notch. I will have to state that I dislike the drop-notch. Honestly, it takes up a lot of space and makes the phone look like it’s from 2018. I’ve become so accustomed to the punch hole -this drop-notch design is way old.

The 20MP sensor is great for taking photographs during the day. It captures every detail and captures skin tones as accurately as possible. For Low-light selfies, it suffers a bit. You could use the screen flash to help or the Night Mode. Both front and selfie cameras can capture videos at FHD resolution at 30fps, but there’s no 4K recording here.

Samsung Galaxy A32 Battery and Charging

The battery capacity on this phone is 5,000 mAH to match up with the powerful processors and huge screens. Honestly, there is nothing to complain about here. This should provide a battery backup for an entire day.

The phone comes with a 15W charger that takes about 2 hours and 20 minutes to juice up the battery to its capacity. 

Display 

This device is big, at 6.4-inches. The reduced bezels, light-weight, and thin design still make it compact enough to hold. The screen is a 90Hz FHD Super AMOLED panel with a resolution of 1080×2400 pixels. With the Adaptive mode, the face lights up at 814 nits, which is plenty bright for viewing even under direct sunlight. 

Software and Performance

Besides Android 12, Samsung uses OneUI 3.1 on the Galaxy A32. Furthermore, Samsung offers 3 years of Android OS upgrades and 4 years of security upgrades with this smartphone. One UI 3.1 comes preloaded on the Galaxy S21, Galaxy S21+, and Galaxy S21 Ultra, so you also enjoy the premium features on the A32.

Galaxy A32 picks up a MediaTek Helio G80 processor. 

Verdict

As I earlier stated, the price tag is a sweet spot for what the device offers. The storage is proper, the battery is superb, the processing is alright, and I love the constant security patches and assured Android updates.

They could have done better with the processor, a Helio G80 chipset is quite slow compared to say a Snapdragon 665 chip. You might notice a few lags here and there, but the device can handle pretty much everything you throw at it. It is value for your money!