The best Android smartphones can also cost considerable amounts, over € 500: in these cases you pay without a doubt the fame of the brand and a decidedly cutting-edge technical sheet. However, not everyone has this money to spend or they just don't want to spend it on a cell phone; in this case it focuses on the cheapest smartphones and among these practically all mount as Android operating system. In the past, those who made this choice regretted it after a short time: ugly phones, which slowed down to improbable and immediately obsolete, made the desire to bet on a cheap Android smartphone go away; luckily these days the situation has improved a lot and it takes very little to get your hands on a good Android phone with all the basic features.
We discover in this guide the features of a good cheap Android smartphone and some of the models we can buy.
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Minimum specifications of a good smartphone
In general, cheap smartphones with Android can be found in the price range of up to € 150, beyond which we already find the mid-range smartphones where shopping starts to get interesting. If we don't have a lot of money to spend, make sure that the cheap smartphone chosen has at least the following characteristics.
- The Screen : on low-cost Android devices the screen usually does not have too high a resolution as on high-end models.
Let's make sure that the resolution is at least HD (1280 x 720 pixels) and the size of at least 5 inches, so that we can get an adequate number of details for the most famous web pages and apps.
- Performance : that of low performance has always been the worst problem on cheap smartphones.
I personally believe that it is not worth buying a smartphone with less than 4 GB of RAM and with a quad core processor, whatever manufacturer offers it (rarely Qualcomm, more frequent Mediatek). In general, with these features, the performance of an Android smartphone is good enough to call, send messages, read emails, internet, Facebook etc.
- Battery : another important chapter, but which could be influenced by the operating system and by the software level customizations applied to the low-end smartphone; in any case better to focus on smartphones that adopt a battery of at least 3000 mAh, so you can face a day with your smartphone.
- Camera : no matter how many Megapixels you have, the camera on cheap smartphones will always be low level, good only for taking a few photos during the day (it will show all its limitations in night photos). Some models also adopt good solutions, but if we want to make beautiful photos it is better to focus on more expensive models.
- Software and firmware : historically low-cost phones have never been supported by their manufacturers (except for a few rare exceptions); a large number of these offer cheap cell phones for sale without foreseeing future software updates. Fortunately, thanks to the new policies of Google which has separated many apps from the operating system, these updates are less important than before and we can say that buying a smartphone with the Android 9.0 version is more than good for the uses we have to make of it; if we find a more updated version even better, but we do not choose more operating systems with versions of Android lower than 9 (they are now too obsolete). Those who are more geeks can undoubtedly install a newer and more updated custom ROM.
- Internal memory : another big problem that plagues low-cost Android phones, besides RAM, is internal memory. The presence of a microSD slot to expand this memory can help a little, but we consider that many apps are installed only in the internal memory and even if they can be moved some files will still be accessible from the internal memory, therefore it must be sufficiently capacious. 32 GB of internal memory is really the minimum we need to focus on, as apps become heavier and the size of shared photos and videos go hand in hand.
The best cheap smartphones with Android
Despite the limitations, the new cheap Android smartphones are still good phones. Even if a low cost smartphone (from 100 to 200 Euros) may not be good for everyone, today it is easier to find business and, thanks also to Chinese devices, excellent deals can be found.
- Xiaomi Redmi 8 : cheap Xiaomi smartphone with 6.3 "screen, 4 GB of RAM, 64 GB of internal memory, 48 + 8 + 2 + 2 mp quadruple camera, fingerprint reader and MIUI operating system constantly updated (based on Android).
- Samsung Galaxy A20e : this Dual Sim smartphone features a 5.8 "IPS screen, quad-core processor, 32 GB of internal memory, 3 GB of RAM, dual cameras, fingerprint reader and Android 9.0 operating system.
- Xiaomi Mi A3 : another very valid Xiaomi smartphone that you can buy in this price range is the Mi A3, which has a 6.1 "Amoled screen, 64 GB of internal memory, 4 GB of RAM, triple rear camera and Android, 9.0 Nougat.
- Huawei Y6 : an excellent budget smartphone from Huawei is the Y6 of 2019, with 6.1 "HD (1280 x 720) IPS display, Quad-Core 2GB RAM processor, 32GB of expandable internal memory and Android 9.0, for only 110 Euros.
- Blackview A60 : this Dual SIM smartphone from Blackview costs 80 Euros and offers a quad-core processor, 6.1 "Full HD display, 16 GB of internal memory, 3 GB of RAM, 8 MP camera, 4000Mah battery, operating system Android, 9.0.
Conclusions
After analyzing all the features and seeing the models offered we can say that today it is really worth buying a cheap smartphone, not only for those who need a basic mobile phone for calls, SMS, emails, navigation, Facebook, but also for play the best games. Today, cheap smartphones are no longer like a few years ago, slow and poor, but excellent devices that, in some cases, also have an excellent battery, a high-level camera and top performance (although all these features will not be found together ).
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