Samsung Galaxy A50 tested: The affordable Galaxy S10
There is no Galaxy S10 Mini, but with the Galaxy A50, Samsung has a smartphone on sale that comes very close to the Galaxy S10 - and is significantly cheaper. The compromises are manageable.
You notice the first difference as soon as you touch it. Samsung has saved on materials. Instead of glass, the back of the Galaxy A50 is made of plastic. Although it is well made, shiny and looks elegant, it does not feel as high-quality as the Galaxy S10. But that shouldn't bother everyone.
Fingerprint sensor in the display and plenty of power
A look at the display makes it clear why the Galaxy A50 can't be an S10 Mini. At 6.4 inches, its touchscreen is larger than that of the S10. There are also no rounded edges and no hole for the camera in the screen. Instead, there is a notch and a wider edge. In terms of quality, however, there is nothing to criticise about the Super AMOLED display. It is bright, has vibrant colours and a sharp resolution of 2340 x 1080 pixels.
Samsung has built the fingerprint sensor into the Galaxy A50 under the display. You can't see it, but the smartphone shows you where to press your finger when you unlock it. Compared to the classic sensors, but also the under-display sensor on the Galaxy S10, the A50 takes significantly longer to unlock the phone - and the error rate is also higher than with classic sensors. Alternatively, you can enter the PIN or use facial recognition, which I was unable to trick with a photo.
Under the bonnet, the Galaxy A50 has enough power to run and launch more than just everyday apps. You can also game graphically complex games such as PUBG Mobile without any problems. The game even selects the highest graphics quality and runs smoothly. This is ensured by the Exynos 9610, a chipset that Samsung develops and manufactures itself, and four gigabytes of RAM.
Wide-angle camera and selfies with effect
There are three camera lenses on the back of the Galaxy A50. These are the main camera with a resolution of 25 megapixels and an ultra-wide-angle camera with a viewing angle of 123 degrees and a resolution of eight megapixels. You cannot directly control the third camera with a resolution of five megapixels. It only provides additional information so that the background is blurred in portrait shots, or "live focus" as Samsung calls the function. There is no zoom.
At first glance, the photos of the Galaxy A50 look good. The colours look natural and everything looks sharp. However, if you enlarge the photos just a little, you immediately notice that the level of detail is not particularly high. In other words: the quality is sufficient for the smartphone and the internet, but if you want to print large posters of your pictures, you should choose a different smartphone.
It is worth activating HDR mode, as it usually brings out a little more. In particular, the contrasts are better harmonised and bright clouds are given more detail. On the other hand, you can leave scene optimisation deactivated. Although it almost always recognises the subject correctly, the result of the selected settings is not noticeably different from the automatic settings. When taking bokeh shots, the software does not always select the edges perfectly. To compensate for this, you can play around with the background and choose between four effects.
The wide-angle camera manages without major distortion at the edges. Despite the low resolution, the image quality does not fall far short of the main camera. However, things look very different in the dark. Here you can see that the wide-angle camera captures less light. The images are much darker than with the main camera. It illuminates the images well with the little available light, but is far behind the Galaxy S10 and other smartphones in this price range in terms of detail.
Front camera with bokeh and wide angle
The front camera of the Galaxy A50 has a very high resolution of 25 megapixels. However, this does not prevent you from activating HDR mode if you want balanced contrasts in your selfies. The colours generally remain unchanged, but I feel as if even more details are visible. Incidentally, the level of detail is high for selfies.
Because the background is usually not that important for selfies, you can activate a bokeh effect on the A50 even without a second front camera, but you have to accept one or two inaccuracies. However, you can also apply effects to the blurred background here. You can also activate a wide-angle mode for the front camera to get more people in the selfie. However, the additional image section is only good for one or two people. At least you don't have to accept any loss of quality here.
When it gets dark, the front camera reaches its limits. Although the images are still bright and the colours are influenced by the respective lighting, instead of details you are looking at coloured areas. This doesn't get any better if you use the flash or the wide-angle function of the front camera.
Large battery and plenty of storage space
At 4000 mAh, the Galaxy A50's battery actually has a larger capacity than the Galaxy S10 - and potentially uses less energy with its hardware. The result: I can easily get through the day with my typical usage and can set my alarm clock in the evening without having to charge the smartphone until the next morning. Thanks to the USB-C port and quick-charging function, you can get a lot of power into the battery in a comparatively short time.
The speaker on the underside of the Galaxy A50 is loud enough, but doesn't sound particularly nice and you'll probably often accidentally cover it with your hand. An external Bluetooth speaker or headphones promise better sound. You can plug these into the existing 3.5 millimetre socket using a cable. The internal memory is generous at 128 gigabytes and should usually be sufficient. If not, you can increase the storage space with a microSD card.
Samsung installs Android 9 Pie as the operating system on the Galaxy A50 and provides Google's software with its own user interface called One UI. This includes numerous apps and services from Samsung, including its own apps store, the Bixby voice assistant and several pre-installed apps from Microsoft. All these defaults bother me and I prefer a tidy Android, but this is not a knock-out criterion against the A50.
Conclusion: Perfect if you don't want to spend a lot of money on a Samsung smartphone
If you like Samsung smartphones because of their looks and software, but don't want to or can't spend a lot of money on a Galaxy S10, the Galaxy A50 is a good affordable alternative. The low price comes with compromises in terms of materials, performance and image quality in the dark, but it is still a fully-fledged smartphone with which you can do everything and have a lot of fun - and at a significantly lower price than the flagship models.
When I was but a young student, I'd sit in my friend's living room with all my classmates and play on his SuperNES. Since then I've had the opportunity to test out all the newest technology for you. I've done reviews at Curved, Computer Bild and Netzwelt, and have now arrived at Galaxus.de.
