£579
samsung.com/ukWE’RE IMPRESSED Affordable
way to get 5G; stylish, premium
design; has a headphone jack!
WE’D IMPROVE 5G networks
still growing; camera could be
better; not the sharpest screen.
THE LAST WORD If you want
5G speeds right now, the
Samsung A90 5G should be
somewhere near the top of
your shortlist – especially when
it comes to the price and the
overall design quality.VERDICT
Find the best deals for the A90
5G at: bit.ly/a905gMARCH 2020 T3 87Te s te d
Samsung Galaxy A90 5Ghe selling point of this phone might
be to get 5G for a mid-range price
(we’ve already seen it available for
£499 shortly after launch), but
while it doesn’t quite have the specs to match
Samsung’s flagships, the A90 5G is still a very
capable phone in its own right – it’s not just 5G
connectivity that it’s got going for it.
A good place to start is the bright and crisp
6.7-inch AMOLED screen, which is just as
impressive as you would expect from Samsung.
You get a decent triple-lens rear camera, and
plenty of internal storage (128GB), plus the
option to expand storage via memory card.
Samsung makes some very smartly designed
phones, and the A90 5G continues the trend.
The only complaint you might have about this
new handset is that it’s too big – this isn’t a
phone for people with small hands. The
resolution is 1080x2400 pixels, one of the very
few mid-range specs in what is otherwise a
premium-level phone. There’s a small teardrop
notch at the top of the display, and the bezels are
pleasingly thin. We also like the single strip of
camera lenses on the back of the device. The
fingerprint sensor is under the screen.
It’s worth mentioning the colours that the
Galaxy A90 5G is available in: as well as the
black that our review unit came in, there’s also
a white option with a rainbow-ish tinge – it’s a
really nice look and probably the one we prefer.
We like the split-texture on the back, too.
As the affordable 5G race
heats up, Samsung storms
ahead with this really well-
rounded handset
Samsung Galaxy
A90 5G
BUDGET 5G
The Snapdragon 855 chip running the phone
was last year’s flagship, and combined with 6GB
or 8GB of RAM, you’re going to get many years
of service out of this phone. It sped through
everything we threw at it, from games to photo
editors, very smoothly indeed. Battery life was
also impressive – we always had plenty left at
the end of the day.
The triple-lens 48MP+8MP+5MP rear camera
impresses too, though there’s no telephoto zoom
here. It’s a little behind more expensive phones
(especially in low light), but you’ll still get
bright, detailed snaps almost all of the time.
And yes, there’s that 5G support which is just
as fast as you’d hope, when you’re in the right
spot. If you’re right in the middle of a city that
already has coverage, the A90 5G offers excellent
value for money for taking advantage of those
super-high speeds. But if you won’t be in a 5G
area as much, we’d be inclined to look at the
OnePlus 7T for the same money, or even the
upcoming Samsung S10 Lite.T