Samsung has an attractive line of powerful phones, including the Galaxy S22. To attract new buyers, it recently launched the Samsung Galaxy A53, essentially a lighter version of the former phone.
Let’s look at this handset in detail and explore whether it’s a good purchase for your needs.
Samsung Galaxy A53 Overview
The Samsung Galaxy A53 5G has an excellent and high-quality screen, a streamlined design, and a great camera experience for its price point. However, there are certain downsides to keep in mind, like general slowness relative to similar phones in the Samsung collection and Apple iPhones.
What’s the Cost of the Samsung Galaxy A53?
The Galaxy A53 starts at $449.99. This marks it as one of the more affordable mid-range phones on the market.
Who Is the Samsung Galaxy A53 Best For?
The Samsung Galaxy A53 is best for college students, working adults who don’t need anything too fancy, or folks who want a powerful, versatile smartphone device that can do it all well enough, if not excelling in any one feature.
It’s not a good pick if you need fast charging, a powerful processor and chipset, or the ability to record and watch videos at 4K 60 FPS resolution.
Breaking Down the Samsung Galaxy A53 in 2022
Let's explore its major features and specifications to determine whether the Samsung Galaxy A53 is the right purchase for you.
Price
As broken down above, this phone starts at $449.99, although you can pick up versions of this model with more storage space for higher costs.
Specs
The Galaxy A53’s dimensions are 6.28 x 2.94 x 0.32”. It weighs 6.67 ounces and features a Gorilla Glass 5 front with a plastic back and frame. It has the Android 12 OS by default, uses an Exynos 1280 chipset, and features an octa-core CPU plus 6GB of RAM. It’s also IP67 dust and water resistant for down to 1 m of depth for 30 minutes.
The A53 is ready for 5G wi-fi connectivity and works with wireless charging.
Design
The Samsung Galaxy A53 is available in four colors out of the box: black, white, blue, and peach. Its design is meant to be “holdable” and manageable as opposed to bulky and unwieldy, so it features a relatively understated rear camera bump.
While the plastic back isn't the most high-end, it does protect the phone adequately against scratches and short drops.
Display
With a 6.5-inch screen, the Samsung Galaxy A53 has a competitive display, especially for its price point. It also comes with a 120 Hz refresh rate and FHD+ resolution.
The bold, colorful Super AMOLED screen does a great job of making colors pop and ensuring your media looks fantastic, even in bright light environments (thanks to the fact that it can produce 800 nits in illumination).
There’s a small punch for the front camera at the top, but it’s relatively unobtrusive.
Camera
This Samsung phone has several cameras, including:
- 64-megapixel main camera
- 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera
- 5-megapixel macro camera
- 32-megapixel selfie camera
- 5-megapixel depth sensor
There are certainly phones with better camera sets, but you can't do much better than this for the above price.
The phone comes preloaded with standard Samsung camera modes, such as a low-light or wide-frame shot mode. Single Take is perfect for grabbing a photo from a series of video footage. Or you could try Food mode, which lets you focus on a specific area for more dramatic-looking pictures of, you guessed it, food and more!
Battery Life/Charging
The Galaxy A53 has a 5000 mAh battery that usually lasts for a full day. However, this phone only features a 25 W charging system, so it usually takes over two hours to recharge your phone from empty to full.
Software
The Galaxy A53 uses Android 12 software with the proprietary Samsung One UI 4.1 for ease of use. Unfortunately, Samsung’s UI is bloated with many unnecessary apps and software, exacerbating the phone’s already-noticeable slowness.
Performance
The Samsung Galaxy A53 uses an Exynos 1280 chipset. Thus, it does feel slower to use than many other phones, even around the same price point. While Samsung makes the chip, it’s not up to snuff compared to other midrange phones like the OnePlus Nord, Oppo Find X2 Lite, and Honor 9X Pro.
You’ll notice that this phone feels relatively slow to navigate from time to time, especially when trying to activate or run multiple applications.
Samsung Galaxy A53: Pros
- Great Battery Life
- Storage Expandable Up to 1TB
- Sleek Design, Stunning Display
- Solid Camera for Price
Great Battery Life
The Galaxy A53’s battery life is decent, usually lasting for a full day between charges. This is true even if you use the phone consistently (though the battery life does decrease if you take advantage of 5G connectivity).
Storage Expandable Up to 1TB
The Galaxy A53’s affordable starting price may allow you to upgrade its storage. The Galaxy A53 is available in models with up to 1 TB of storage space: perfect for keeping hundreds or thousands of photos and lots of videos from your adventures.
Sleek Design, Stunning Display
The Galaxy A53’s design, and the highly colorful and contrasting display, make up for its bloated UI and software limitations. It's a great-looking phone through and through, and it even feels comfortable to hold compared to many other handsets of its type. It can achieve a 120hz refresh rate in most cases like other Android phones.
Solid Camera for Price
Above all else, the Galaxy A53 is a solid, well-rounded handset that you can pick up for less than $500 at the start. That alone makes it a tremendous potential pick for budget-minded shoppers.
Samsung Galaxy A53: Cons
- No Audio Jack
- Slow Charging
- Can’t Record 4K 60fps Video
No Audio Jack
One of the main downsides of the Samsung Galaxy A53 is its lack of a headphone jack. That means you'll need to rely on wireless earbuds or headphones if you want to listen to your media privately or enjoy music on the go.
Slow Charging
As noted above, the Galaxy A53’s 5000mAh battery charges relatively slowly. Oddly, you’ll have to pre-plan your charging sessions if you don’t want to run out of battery unexpectedly or at an inopportune moment.
Can’t Record 4K 60fps Video
On top of that, the Galaxy A53 cannot record video in 4K 60 FPS resolution. This could be a dealbreaker for phone shoppers who only like handsets that can capture top-tier videos for personal enjoyment or YouTube uploads. In this regard, it’s a bit worse than the comparable Google Pixel 5A or Google Pixel 6.
Should You Buy the Samsung Galaxy A53?
Yes, for its average overall performance.
The Galaxy A53 is a good buy if you're looking for something reasonably powerful and performative without breaking the bank. But don't expect any miracles from this phone regarding overall performance or multitasking. Compare this phone to others and find the right device for your needs with Navi’s Phone Navigator page.
