Samsung Galaxy A31

Over a period of time, Samsung has continued to sustain a very organized ingress into the mid-range phone market, constantly producing new models and then going back in again to build variants from the initial models. This is certainly true the Samsung M series, and specifically to the Samsung Galaxy A31, launched in March 2020. It’s a true beauty, offering some very sought after features like an AMOLED screen, a very huge battery and a quad-camera set up. Let’s take a peek.

Design and display of Samsung Galaxy A31

The Samsung Galaxy A31 comes with a 6.4 inch super AMOLED capacitive screen with an Infinity U teardrop design screen, with a 1080p resolution and an unusual 20:9 aspect ratio. The PPI density ratio stands at 411 while the screen to body ratio maxes out at 84.9%. The Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protected front screen blends into the middle hardened plastic frame onto the plain plastic back. At the back, we find a quad-camera set up, visibly inspired by the Samsung S20 design. It lacks the back fingerprint scanner because it employs the optical under-display option, in addition to face unlock biometrics. At the bottom, we have a downward-firing speaker grill, a USB-C connector and commendably, a 3.5mm headphone jack. The phone is a little heavy and thicker, owing to a massive battery, weighing in at 185g and is 8.6mm thick.

Performance and storage

The Samsung Galaxy A31 runs the Helio P65 chipset, with an up to 2GHz octa-core CPU, configured into a duo 2.0 GHz cores and six 1.7 GHz cores. This SoC is stack in the middle of midrange territory so the performance is quite optimized. The memory options include 4/6gb for RAM and 64/128gb for ROM, with a dedicated microSDXC slot, capable of expanding the memory by an extra 512GB. That kind of memory should be enough for pretty much all manner of use, signaling that large memory is no longer a premise of high-end flagship devices. The experience is fast smooth and fluid, with easy multitasking, faster opening of apps and less frame drops for intensive tasks like gaming.

Camera

The Samsung Galaxy A31 really goes all out on the camera department. It comes with a quad-camera setup, starting off with the massive 48mp 26mm wide-angle primary shooter, then an 8mp 13mm ultra-wide lens, a dedicated 5mp macro lens and a 5mp depth sensor. As expected, the photos are very good, with richer colour, sharper images, and more details. The additional macro and depth sensors do great service to the close-up and portrait shot. The bokeh is amazing and light conditions no longer seem to matter. The low light shots are clearly improved, with the wider exposure times in the primary camera allowing for better Night Mode. It can record 4K video at 30fps, 2k at 30fps, Full HD at up to 120fps and & 720p at up to 240fps, in addition to HDR and Panorama. The front facing shooter is a single 20mp wide lens, clearly capable, achieving Full HD at 30fps. The selfies are clear, sharp and very vivid.

Battery

The Samsung Galaxy A31 comes with the new massive 5000mAh non removable Li-Po battery, a welcome addition to the Aseries, after it was adopted in the Mseries. The battery is more than enough for any type of user, easily clocking 2 days at times. This is a lot of power, and coupled with Samsung’s One UI smart power management system, offers several days of standby battery time. To sweeten the deal even better, the Samsung Galaxy A31 comes with 15W fast charging which helps hasten filling up the huge battery with juice to a little over 2 hours. It however has no wireless charging.

Software

Out of the box, the Samsung Galaxy A31 comes with the best and latest Android 10.0 OS with Samsung’s One UI 2 custom skin on top. The bloatware in the new updated UI is almost minimal, giving it a clean, modern and light feel. It is impressively fast, giving off a feel of a flagship device. The additional productive bag of tricks inside the One UI 2 ensures a highly recommended user experience. It is inarguably one of the top Android experiences out there.

The Samsung Galaxy A31 is a very powerful device. The device is clearly optimized for long hours of heavy use, in addition to a very vivid screen. It supports NFC, dual standby nano SIM and Bluetooth 5. It has no IP ratings for water or dust but comes advertised as splash proof. It comes in Black, Red, White and Blue.

Samsung Galaxy A31 Specifications