What to look for when choosing a cheap smartphone

If a smartphone is cheap, it does not mean that it is bad. Of course, budget segment gadgets do not have the impressive features that flagships can boast of. But even for $100 you can get a gadget that will fully satisfy your daily needs. The main thing is to choose the right one. Here’s what to look out for when buying a cheap smartphone.

Performance

Buying a smartphone for $100, you are unlikely to find a model with an eight-core processor. Today, quad-core Cortex-A53 chipsets and the older Cortex-A7 are typical at this price point. They provide a quite satisfactory experience for everyday use, although you will certainly notice some stutter at times.

Smartphones under $100 usually have 1GB or 2GB of RAM. It is strongly recommended to look for a model with 2 GB. And in no case do not look towards models with 512 MB. This volume is not enough even for comfortable surfing on the Internet. We also recommend choosing a model running a lightweight Android Go operating system, which does not pull on a lot of system resources.

Memory

Cheap smartphones, as a rule, have a rather modest amount of internal memory. You won’t find 64GB or 32GB models here. Even 16 GB at this price point is a rarity. The output is a memory card. When choosing, be sure to pay attention to whether the smartphone supports microSD, and if it does, what is the maximum size of the card. If a model with a small amount of native memory does not support microSD, do not even look in its direction. Running out of space is one of the most annoying problems one can face. Trust me, you don’t need it.

Display

Smartphones with AMOLED displays in the lower price category do not inhabit. Count on liquid crystals. Surprisingly, but among the cheap models there are a variety of diagonals, from 4 to 6 inches. True, the display resolution is usually low, 480p and 540p, less often — 720p.

Keep in mind that the larger screen you choose, the more resolution it needs to display a clear picture. So, a 4-inch display with a resolution of 960 x 540 pixels looks sharp, but a 5.5-inch display with the same resolution already looks blurry. For models with a diagonal of 5.5 inches, 720p can be considered the minimum resolution.

Camera

Smartphones with two cameras have fallen in price recently, but have not yet hit the lower price segment. That is, for $100 you should expect a single sensor from 5MP to 13MP. Of course, there are no options like optical image stabilization in such cameras. It should be understood that such cameras are needed not so much for creating highly artistic portraits, but for purely utilitarian tasks, such as reading QR codes or translating text into Google Translate.

Front cameras in cheap smartphones tend to have even more modest sensors, from 2MP to 8MP. In general, smartphones in this price range cannot be called camera phones. You just have to come to terms with this.

However, even a weak camera can take decent pictures, if you know how to shoot.

Battery

Most models under $100 have a 2000 to 3000 mAh battery. But there are exceptions with 4000 and even 5000 mAh, for example, the budget model Nokia 2.

I do not recommend looking towards models with a battery capacity of less than 3000 mAh. This is a necessary minimum for comfortable use. And already a 4000 mAh battery will provide you with 2-3 days of work on a single charge.