The $349 Galaxy A50 Is Samsung's Pixel 3a Killer with Bigger Screen and 3 Cameras

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Samsung is giving shoppers a midtier option with the $349 Galaxy A50, which delivers three rear cameras and a big battery. Here's all the specs.

If you're not willing to shell out for a big-bucks flagship phone, device makers are increasingly ready to meet your price. And Samsung is the latest company to try its hand at a less expensive phone that still offers some premium features.

Credit: Samsung

(Image credit: Samsung)

Galaxy A50 Camera: Three rear lenses

The Galaxy A50 also puts an emphasis on mobile photography, with a multi-lens setup that's meant to approach what you get from the S10 lineup. The A50 features a 25-megapixel main shooter augmented by an 8-MP wide angle lens that offers a 123-degree field of view. In addition, there's a 5-MP depth lens on the back of the A50 to help produce bokeh effects on portrait shots.

That's not far off from what you get with the latest phones in Samsung's Galaxy S series. The S10e, for example, sports two rear lenses — a 12-MP main camera with a variable aperture and a 16-MP ultra wide angle lens. (The aperture on the A50's main camera is fixed at f/1.7, so there's one of the trade-offs you'll make with the less expensive phone.)

The more expensive S10 models add a telephoto lens to that setup. So while A50 owners won't get the optical zoom that Samsung's more expensive phones feature, they'll still be able to take more detailed landscape photos and add effects to their portraits.

The A50 will also benefit from the Scene Optimizer feature that Samsung uses on its more expensive phones. This software-powered tool uses artificial intelligence to recognize 20 different scenes and adjust camera settings to take the best possible shot.

Galaxy A50 Specs vs Pixel 3a

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Galaxy A50
Pixel 3a
Price
$349
$399
Screen (Resolution)
6.4-inch OLED (2340 x 1080)
5.6-inch OLED (2260 x 1080)
CPU
Exynos 9610
Snapdragon 670
RAM
4GB
4GB
Storage
64GB
64GB
MicroSD?
Yes
No
Rear Camera
25-MP main (f/1.7), 8-MP wide (f/2.2), 5-MP depth (f/2.2)
12-MP (f/1.8)
Front Camera
25-MP (f/2.0)
8-MP (f/2.0)
Battery Size
4,000 mAH
3,000 mAh
Availability
Verizon
Google Fi, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon

As for the front of the phone, the Galaxy A50's 6.4-inch OLED screen trades the punch-hole cutout of the Galaxy S10 lineup's Infinity-O display for an Infinity-U panel with a teardrop notch to house the front camera. That selfie cam is a 25-MP shooter. Notches aren't universally popular, but the teardrop design does allow the A50 to use thinner bezels on the top of the phone, squeezing more screen space into its 6.2 x 2.9 x 0.3-inch frame.

In other parts of the world, the Galaxy A50 runs on Samsung's own Exynos 9610 chipset, and that's apparently what will power the U.S. version. (For the U.S. releases of its Galaxy S and Galaxy Note phones, Samsung uses Qualcomm's Snapdragon mobile processing platform while other markets get Exynos-powered phones.) The phone will feature 4GB of RAM and you can augment its 64GB of onboard storage with up to 512GB of storage via a microSD slot.

The Galaxy A50 will top some S10 models in at least one area. It's got a 4,000 mAh battery, which is the same size as the power pack inside the Galaxy S10 Plus — a phone that costs $650 more. The S10 Plus is among the longest lasting phones we've tested, so we're eager to find out if the Galaxy A50 makes the most of its big battery.

More Galaxy A Series phones to come

Look for other phones to join the Galaxy A50 later this summer. Samsung says the $249 Galaxy A20 and $179 Galaxy A10e are coming to the U.S. as well, though there's no specific launch date. Carriers offering Samsung's A Series phones include AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon, U.S. Cellular and Comcast's Xfinity Mobile service.

The A20 will also feature a 4,000 mAh battery along with a 6.4-inch display, 13-MP rear camera and 32GB of storage, while the 5.83-inch Galaxy A10e offers an 8-MP camera, 3,000 mAh battery and 32GB of storage. Both phones use an Infinity-V display, which features a teardrop cutout for the front camera that's more V-shaped than the rounder Infinity-U cutout.

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Philip Michaels
Philip Michaels

Philip Michaels is a Managing Editor at Tom's Guide. He's been covering personal technology since 1999 and was in the building when Steve Jobs showed off the iPhone for the first time. He's been evaluating smartphones since that first iPhone debuted in 2007, and he's been following phone carriers and smartphone plans since 2015. He has strong opinions about Apple, the Oakland Athletics, old movies and proper butchery techniques. Follow him at @PhilipMichaels.