Upmarket build.

Unimpressive fingerprint recognition speed.

And that's before you account for the fact that it's the most affordable point of entry into 5G coming from Samsung. It's not as good value as what Xiaomi can give you, but competing offers from other big names like LG and Motorola come at an even...

Excellent design ; Big and beautiful AMOLED screen ; Flexible multi-camera system

Laggy performance ; Camera quality is largely unremarkable ; Mediocre battery life

Sure, the Pixel 3a XL and the iPhone SE lack the A51’s panache, but they’re just nicer to use . And hey -- if you’re really itching for a Samsung phone and have some latitude in your budget, the slightly more powerful Galaxy A71 might be a better...

Modern design ; Excellent display ; Good photos with enough light ; Good battery life ; A headphone jack

Lackluster performance ; Slower fingerprint sensor ; Won't receive OS updates quickly

Attractive design;Good screen;Impressive, versatile camera

Battery life could be much better

Compact and light for the display size and battery capacity, standout design.

Chipset isn't as powerful as what the competition has to offer.

More importantly, key rivals come at a lower price, with few objective trade-offs. With that in mind, we can't wholeheartedly recommend the Galaxy A51 at the current price. If you absolutely must have a Samsung (which is a sentiment we can understand),...

Great 6.5-inch OLED screen ; Headphone jack ; Nice build quality

Camera isn’t anything special ; Battery life isn’t what it could be ; Slow

Samsung’s $399 Galaxy A51 smartphone is Android’s first big attempt to take on the iPhone SE. It has a big 6.5-inch screen, a 4,000mAh battery, and a 48-megapixel camera. Samsung says all three are "awesome," but only one is.

Great display ; High quality looks ; Good main camera performance in most conditions ; Solid battery life ; Under display fingerprint scanner

Lacks overall power ; Some lag in usage ; Single speaker limited ; Easy to block Bluetooth antenna and cause cut-out ; Quad cameras oversell themselves a little

A great design and screen are the big sells of this mid-ranger, which performs generally well but can struggle a little when it comes to gaming tasks. Otherwise the clean software experience makes for a generally polished and affordable choice.