Smartphone Alternatives
Having a ‘choosing conundrum’ while selecting your next smartphone? Well folks, here’s something that might help you organize your choices with subtlety.
The Budget Segment (~20k)
The Indian budget Smartphone segment is all hullabaloos as it accounts for 90% of the Indian Smartphone sales. Xiaomi Corp, Oppo, Vivo, and Realme are the budget segment rulers accounting for 80% of the low budget Smartphones in India. Realme and Xiaomi recently launched the Realme 7 Pro and the Redmi Note 9 pro max priced at 19,999Rs and 16,999Rs respectively. Poco, Xiaomi’s subsidiary also launched the POCO X2 under its famous ‘POCO’ branding priced at 17,499Rs. Samsung, the only non-Chinese brand competing in the budget segment, has launched the M31 and M31s respectively at 16,499Rs and 19,499Rs. Now, how do these two flare up against the competition?
While the Chinese smartphone brands offer a lot of value for money, brand value is something they miss on heavily. While the POCO is the only one offering the Snapdragon 730, its tacky build quality and glossy plastic render a very cheap feel to it. The Realme 7 Pro has a premium feel to it along the back and offers the fastest charging speeds at 65W which will juice up your phone to 100% in 34mins and 50% in 12 mins. It also offers a decent camera performance for the price point but is the priciest of the lot and offers Snapdragon 720G in comparison with POCO’s 730, which costs much less. The M31s, on the other hand, offers gains in the camera department, a much larger battery, and a super AMOLED screen which has the best saturation, sharpness, good camera, and colour accuracy. So it’s a tough choice between the three. In my opinion, it boils down to preference here.
The M31 is a decent offering in comparison to the Redmi Note 9 pro. Samsung has worked a lot to make the One UI bloatware free and it is one of the most refined software experience you can get now. Plus Xiaomi pushes Ads via its mobile phones which is something to look into. The M31 has a plastic back in comparison to the glass sandwich Corning Gorilla Glass 5 back of the Redmi Note 9 pro but the built quality is solid. Samsung also offers a bigger battery at 6000mAH. Camera performance is decent on both but the night mode sucks on the M31 with Samsung’s tendency to over-soften the picture to blur out the noise which affects detail. The Redmi gets beaten in the day time though when it tends to aggrandize detail on the subject and loses out on HDR. Both have their pros and cons but in my opinion, Samsung wins this with a clean UI and brand value with a lesser price offering in comparison to the Redmi Note 9 Pro.
You may also consider the Nokia 8.1, which although released way back in 2018 provides a stock android experience and has quite nice features. If you value stock android then this is still the phone for you below 20k.
Mid Range and Upper Mid Range (20k-30k) and (30–50k).
(20k-30k)- The only competition here is between One plus Nord, Realme X3 Superzoom, and the new Non-Chinese hot release, Samsung M51s.
While the One-Plus lived up to the hype of the One-Plus Nord which aligned with One-Plus’s motto of being the “flagship killer”, Samsung just spiced up the competition by releasing the new M51 with comes with a ginormous 7000mAH juice box. 4500 mAH has been quite ubiquitous for some time now in this segment. The One-Plus has the edge with its fluidic 90 Hz display and the Snapdragon 765G which is much snappier compared to the 730G on the Samsung M51 in the same price bracket. Both have good cameras with one plus offering an ultra-wide sensor on the front and Samsung offering a bigger 12 MP ultrawide sensor. Also, the Oxygen OS is arguably the smoothest android experience after the stock android on the Pixel phones. The ONE UI has also done its homework quite well on the 2.0 version. One-Plus might come with a significantly less small battery but with the 30W Warp Charge it juices up the phone to 65% of capacity in 30 mins which is quite impressive already. In short, go for the One-Plus already! The M51 is the only fresh Non-Chinese option in this price segment.
But if you can stretch your legs to 28K then the Realme X3 superzoom comes with the flagship Snapdragon 855+. If you are confused between the One Plus Nord 8GB variant and the X3 superzoom then the later is a better choice. It even offers five times optical zoom along with a 60X combined zoom with the main camera seen on the likes of flagships, like the Samsung s20 plus. The rest of the specs are almost identical to the One plus Nord.
(30k-50k)- The flare-up here is between the One Plus 8, Asus ROG Phone 3, the upcoming Samsung S20 Fe, Realme X50 pro, and the Vivo X50 Pro
It’s obsequious that One-Plus rules this segment with its flagship killer offering in the form of the fabled One-Plus 8. It’s a very decent offering with this price segment offering ‘bang on bucks’ for people who are Blossom and Buttercup rolled in one. Didn’t get that reference? :P.Well, the One-Plus does come with its shortcomings such as a decent camera with its rivals offering better specs with a tad bit higher price. The Upcoming Samsung S20 Fe offers a great camera performance in comparison to the One-Plus 8 and also is a good non-Chinese* option to the later. Also comes into S20 Fe is the Snapdragon 865plus and a better LP DDR5x RAM. The S20 Fe also comes with expandable storage via a Micro Sd slot and a 120Hz fluidic display which is better than the 90 Hz OLED panel on the One plus 8. But, if you are wandering with a more constrained budget then the Realme X 50 Pro has you covered as it offers almost all the specs similar to the One-Plus 8 sans the IP68 water and dust resistance, although it is splash-proof. The Realme also offers the Snapdragon 865+ in comparison to the *Snapdragon 865 on the One Plus-8.
The Asus ROG-3 Phone is for those who are gaming nerds. The phone comes with air and vapor cooling along with a beefed-up Snapdragon 865+. It also has horizontal USB ports for connecting gaming-specific accessories such as a controller, an additional battery pack, and a cooling fan. The Phone also comes with a decent array of camera specs but it is mostly oriented for gamers. If you are a tech nerd then you might like the most powerful phone of the world currently in your pockets (Most powerful Android smartphone according to AnTuTu benchmark). The phone also has two loud front-firing speakers which support Dolby Atmos 2.0 to render seamless audio and bass experience while gaming. It also comes with a host of ROG (Republic of Gamers) perks. Also, Asus is a Taiwanese gaming giant so you can be sure that this is a no-nonsense phone.
The Vivo X50 pro on the other hand is a camera oriented phone. It has the world’s first ‘Gimbal’ oriented primary camera with 360 degrees OIS (Optical Image Stabilization) which makes the camera very stable for shooting videos. It is also equipped with a great zoom camera (a periscope and a 2x optical zoom camera). If you make a lot of vlogs, are a photogenic person, and want a Go-Pro like stability in your camera then the Vivo X50 Po is for you. It’s hands down the best camera oriented smartphone in this segment offering Flagship grade performance in the camera department.
Also if you want a phone within 30k-40k, we would suggest the One Plus 7 Pro. At 37,999 it is the best phone in that segment. Even though the Snapdragon 855 dates a generation back, it’s still a powerful chipset and won’t belch when you throw tasks at it.
*-Non Chinese product.
