Samsung Galaxy A34 5G review

Best Prices Today: Samsung Galaxy A34 5G

€389

Flagship phones are expensive, even on contract, but the good news is that there are cheaper options which are perfectly good.

Samsung’s Galaxy A34 is a great example of this. It looks much like the flagship S23 – especially in the Awesome Lime colour on review here – but costs less than half the price at just £349.

For a lot of people, the A34 is all the phone they need: it has a great screen, long battery life, good performance and takes perfectly decent photos.

And because it’s a Samsung, the phone will be well supported with software and security updates for years to come.

Design & build

• Comes in lime, purple, silver and black
• Plastic rear and frame
• Stereo speakers

The A34 is a large phone, something that seems to be the norm for most mid-range phones now. It’s a bit bigger than the Galaxy A54 measuring 161.3 x 78.1 x 8.2mm, but weighing a few grams less at a whisker under 200g.

It feels great in the hand despite all the plastic, and looks much more expensive than it really is. Much of the appeal comes from its similarity to the S23 and, at a glance, most people will assume you have Samsung’s latest and greatest model. Which is good if that sort of thing appeals to you.

Jim Martin / Foundry

Pleasingly, the black bezel around the screen is (almost) the same thickness on all sides and the selfie camera sits symmetrically in the centre.

Although the frame has a curved profile, its edges feel a little sharp. The main criticism, however, is that the back panel can be depressed a little and therefore feels flimsy rather than solid.

It’s also a shame that, unlike most rival mid-range phones, you don’t get a clear case in the box. In fact, you get almost nothing: just a USB-C to USB-C cable and a tool to remove the SIM tray.

A case, then, is something you should probably order at the same time as the phone.

Impressively, Samsung has put high-quality haptics into the A34. This really helps to make it feel like a much more premium phone. The default intensity for system vibrations is set very low, so you may think they’re disabled but it’s simple to adjust it.

Screen & speakers

• 6.6in AMOLED display
• 120Hz refresh rate
• Stereo speakers

Although becoming more common now, a few years ago you’d have had no right to expect a screen this good on a mid-range phone.

Jim Martin / Foundry

It’s a 6.6in AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate. This means scrolling is super smooth and colours are vibrant.

But that’s not all: it’s also very bright. Samsung claims it can go up to 1000 nits, and it’s certainly easier to see outdoors than a lot of phones, especially at this price.

It may not have the highest resolution around, but Full HD+ is high enough that everything looks sharp and detailed.

There’s a fingerprint sensor built into the screen. The optical tech didn’t work reliably during my testing, telling me the finger I had only just registered didn’t match. It worked most of the time after that, but not every time. You don’t have to use it, of course, but the face recognition isn’t as secure, and a PIN, password or pattern is less convenient.

Jim Martin / Foundry

The Galaxy A34 also has stereo speakers, with the one at the top of the phone being almost invisible. But they’re well balanced and loud at full volume and great for watching videos or listening to podcasts, though not so much for music with very little bass.

Specs & performance

• MediaTek Dimensity 1080
• 6/8GB RAM
• Mostly smooth performance

Unusually, Samsung has opted for a MediTek processor rather than one of its own Exynos chipsets for the Galaxy A34.

This is no bad thing, though, as the Dimensity 1080 has plenty of power and makes the A34 feel fast and responsive in general use. There’s no stuttering as you swipe between home screens or while navigating menus. And is has 5G support like the A54.

It’s no gaming powerhouse, but there’s enough grunt for most games, even if you have to turn down the detail levels a bit to get smooth frame rates.

Jim Martin / Foundry

The high-refresh-rate display adds to the feeling of slick performance when scrolling through social media feeds. No doubt the base 6GB of RAM helps, too, and it’s possible to find 8GB versions of the A34 depending upon where it the world you live.

On the top edge you’ll find a dual-SIM tray. One of the slots can alternatively be used to expand the 128GB (or 256GB) of storage by up to 1TB. If you want to use two SIMs, both support 5G.

Cameras

• 48Mp main with OIS
• 8Mp ultra-wide
• 5Mp macro
• 13Mp selfie

They might look like the cameras on the Galaxy S23, but the A34’s triple lenses cover a more mediocre selection of sensors than Samsung’s flagship.

Jim Martin / Foundry

However, this isn’t to say this phone can’t take good photos: it absolutely can. And as Samsung owners are already used to, the default settings produce highly saturated, good-looking pictures that are ready to share.

The main camera takes, unsurprisingly, the best photos. Outdoors in bright light, photos are detailed and sharp. Indoors, that sharpness goes away and subjects – kids and pets, say – need to stay still if you don’t want them to be a blurry mess.

At night or when there’s dim lighting, the A34’s cameras do struggle compared to the best phones out there and you shouldn’t expect great results unless you rest the phone on something solid and – again – nothing in the scene is moving.

Jim Martin / Foundry

See also  HP Omen 16 (2023) review

The ultra-wide camera does a decent job considering its limited resolution and the software plays its part in ensuring colours look the same as photos from the main camera. It’s certainly useful when you can’t otherwise fit everyone or everything into the shot.

The camera app cheekily shows a 2x button alongside 1x and 0.5x. This just crops photos taken with the main camera but, to be fair, they still look reasonably good.

The third camera is not a telephoto one, but a macro. It’s there to make up the numbers and it’s doubtful you’ll use it much after playing with it when you first get the phone, especially as you don’t even need to switch to it to get some nice closeups from the main camera, as demonstrated by the photo of the beetles in the slideshow above.

The selfie camera produces a noticeable beautifying effect as standard but you can turn this off if you prefer a natural look. The 13Mp camera doesn’t produce masses of detail, but that certainly helps if you want to hide some wrinkles. It’s fun that Snapchat filters are built into the selfie mode, too.

Although done in software, you can adjust the field of view for the front camera, and it will ask you which view to use as the default. Software is also used for pseudo-bokeh when you use the Portrait mode: it isn’t great at identifying the subject and background, so the effect looks fake when wisps of hair are accidentally blurred out.

Video defaults to 1080p at 30fps, and videos shot using this mode are fine and have good stabilisation and reasonable audio quality.

Straying from these settings is unwise: 1080p at 60fps footage lacks stabilisation, and it gets worse if you switch to 4K.

Battery life & charging

• 5000mAh battery 
• 25W charging 
• No adapter included 

The Galaxy A34 has a 5000mAh battery, which is standard for most Samsung phones. Since the Dimensity chipset doesn’t use loads of power, this is a phone which can last two days if you don’t use it heavily.

Even if you do, you should still get through a full day without needing to recharge. Only using battery-draining apps that use GPS such as Google Maps for hours, or playing intensive games will cause the A34 to run out of juice much sooner.

PCMark for Android reported almost identical battery life to the Galaxy A54 at 10 hours 59 minutes.

Jim Martin / Foundry

If you have a 25W charger, the phone will “fast charge” using the supplied cable. Even then, it’s nowhere near as quick as the fastest charging phones. Expect around 15-20% charge in 15 minutes, roughly a third in 30 minutes and a full charge in about two hours.

Usefully, it will show an estimate of how long it will take for a full charge when you plug it in, so at least you’ll know. There is no wireless charging at all as you would expect at this price.

If you’re used to charging your phone overnight, none of this is an issue at all, and the trade-offs are more than reasonable considering the price.

Software & apps

• Android 13 
• One UI 5.1 
• Four years of OS upgrades

Out of the box, the Galaxy A34 runs Android 13 with Samsung’s One UI 5.1 over the top. It’s easy on the eyes and intuitive enough to use.

Notifications are neat, and the quick settings tray includes shortcuts to control Media Output (i.e. to which devices sound and video are sent) and Device Control, which includes shortcuts to Samsung SmartThings.

Jim Martin / Foundry

There isn’t too much bloatware, but it is irritating that – during setup – you’re told that TikTok, Disney+ and Nextdoor are “essential” apps and will be downloaded when you connect to Wi-Fi.

There’s no option to prevent this from happening, but you can uninstall them later.

As the A34 has an AMOLED screen, you can enable and customise the always-on display. By default it is on, but set to only show the clock and notifications when you tap the screen. If you don’t mind the hit on battery life, you can choose for this to remain truly always on, or to only switch off overnight between the hours you set.

The good news is that this phone is treated the same as Samsung’s flagships as far as software updates are concerned. The company promises four years of OS updates (which should take you to Android 16) and five years of security updates.

This is a big advantage over a lot of other phones, whose makers typically provide two or three Android updates at most.

Jim Martin / Foundry

Price & availability

The Galaxy A34 costs £349 direct from Samsung as well as other places such as Amazon, Argos and Currys. You can also pay an extra £50 and get the model with 256GB instead, although only Samsung appears to offer the higher-capacity model in all colours.

The A34 isn’t yet available in the US, but its bigger brother, the Galaxy A54 is. It costs $449.99 from Samsung, or carriers including AT&T, Verizon, T Mobile and US Cellular.

At this price, you might also consider the Redmi Note 12 Pro, Poco X5 and OnePlus Nord CE 3 Lite 5G.

Verdict

The Galaxy A34 is a very good mid-range phone, especially if you specifically want a Samsung at a more affordable price than an S-series model.

You could always consider a refurbished phone to get last year’s flagship at a big discount, or take a look at our roundup of the best mid-range phones to see what the Chinese manufacturers offer for a similar price.

It is possible, for example, to get a phone with a faster processor or with a charger (also faster) and case for similar or less money. But trade-offs elsewhere are inevitable.

Ultimately, the Galaxy A34 is good value and ticks the right boxes for most people and, unless you want slightly better cameras and performance, better value than the Galaxy A54.

Specs

• Android 13 with One UI 5.1
• 6.6in AMOLED, 2340 x 1080, 120Hz, 19.5:9 aspect ratio
• Mediatek MT6877V Dimensity 1080 chipset
• 6/8GB RAM
• 128/256GB of storage (expandable via microSDXC)
• Cameras:
  • 48Mp f/1.8 OIS main camera
• Dual-SIM (microSDXC shares second slot)
• Stereo speakers
• NFC
• GPS
• Bluetooth 5.3
• Wi-Fi 6
• Under-display fingerprint sensor
• 5000mAh battery
• 25W wired charging
• USB-C charging port
• 161.3 x 78.1 x 8.2mm
• 199g