Samsung has been shipping its flagship smartphones without a charger in the box since the Samsung Galaxy S21 launched last year. Now the company appears to be taking the same approach toward its budget phones.
Last week the company began taking orders in the US for the $160 Galaxy A03s and $250 Galaxy A13 5G smartphones. Both phones come with a USB in the box, but no power adapter.
Some phone makers have been shipping devices without chargers for the past few years, with Apple kicking off the trend with the launch of the iPhone 12 in 2020. The idea is that most people these folks buying phones these days aren’t buying their first phone – and while you may be looking to replace your old phone with a newer model, odds are that the charger you used with your older device is still perfectly usable. So why send you a new one that you don’t need?
Of course, some folks do need a charger because they may be buying their first phone, their old charger may not be compatible with their new device, or perhaps they want to take advantage of fast-charging capabilities that their own phones lacked. Those folks will have to pay extra to buy a new power adapter when purchasing a phone that doesn’t come with one.
What’s a bit odd is that this trend started with flagship phones with high price tags before filtering down to cheap phones that likely have lower profit margins. Honestly it would have made more sense to start with cheap phones.
But this is hardly the first time we’ve seen the omission of a feature hit premium devices first. Want a phone with a headphone jack, microSD card reader, or maybe even a removable battery? There are budget and mid-range phones with all of those features, but good luck finding a phone in the $1000 price range that has any of those things.
As for Samsung’s new phones, if you’re looking for a budget phone you could probably do worse than the Galaxy A13 5G. This $250 phone has a 6.5 inch 1600 x 7620 pixel display with a 90 Hz refresh rate, a MediaTek Dimensity 700 processor, 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage, WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0 support, a 5,000 mAh battery, a 50MP primary camera, Android 11 software, and a microSD card reader with support for cards up to 1TB.
It also supports 15-watt fast charging when used with a compatible charger. You’ll just need to supply your own.
The Galaxy A03s is a little less impressive, with a 6.5 inch, 1600 x 720 pixel 60 Hz display, a MediaTek Helio P35 processor, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, and a 13MP primary camera. This phone tops out at WiFi 4, but it does support Bluetooth 5.0 and features the same 5,000 mAh battery and 15-watt fast charging support though, and support for microSD cards up to 1TB.
Both phones have headphone jacks.
via Phone Arena
I appreciate the large battery and mostly-affordable prices of these phone models but my pockets haven’t grown 0.87 inches to hold such a large phone and I really don’t want to wear a fanny pack to hold a new phablet, either. If only the manufacturers would make smaller phones with decent specs to see if there’s a market for people like me.
I don’t mind phones not shipping with chargers but if my first USB-C phone doesn’t come with one, it will be a bit of a bummer. Then again, it probably won’t be one of these pocket seam-busters.
Thanks for keeping us informed, Brad!