Samsung Galaxy M20 Price in India: Starting at Rs.10990

Clearly, the Galaxy M20 is a decent phone and is a winner for Samsung in the mid-range segment which it needs badly. The phone packs a good display with slim bezels, despite plastic, the design and build is on point for the pricing, the 5000mAh battery can easily last two days with minimal usage, has USB Type-C port, 3.5mm audio jack, and fast charging support. However, on the downside, the cameras are average, still runs on Oreo. So, if you are on the lookout for a phone in the sub Rs 12,000 segment, you can have the Galaxy M20 in the list.

Samsung has changed gears and is all in to go against the likes of Xiaomi, Huawei, ASUS who are currently dominating the price-sensitive markets like India, especially in the mid-range segment. The company recently launched the Galaxy M-series that aim to offer value for money. One among the series is the Galaxy M20. With its 6.3-inch Full HD+ screen a huge 5000mAh battery with fast charging and more, the handset looks terrific for a budget phone on paper. In our today’s review, we take a closer look at the phone to see if it's worth the money you spend. Read along.

The Samsung Galaxy M20 sports a 6.3-inch (2340 x 1080 pixels) Full HD+ TFT 19.5:9 TFT display. It is powered by the Exynos 7904 14nm Octa-Core processor with Mali-G71 GPU. It comes in two variants; one with 3GB RAM and 32GB storage and another with 4GB RAM and 64GB Storage that is further expandable up to 512GB via micro SD card. It runs on Android 8.1 Oreo with Experience U.I 9.5 on top.

As for the optics, the Galaxy M20 features dual rear cameras consisting of a 13MP primary shooter with LED flash, f/1.9 aperture, and a 5MP ultra-wide angle camera with f/2.2 aperture. There is an 8MP front-facing shooter with f/2.0 aperture. The Galaxy M20 has a read-mounted fingerprint sensor. It measures 156.4x74.5x8.8mm and connectivity features include Dual 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 5, GPS. There is a 5000mAh battery with fast charging on board.

Samsung Galaxy M20 is the start of a new series for Samsung in the budget segment and the company did a good job. While it packs an all plastic build in comparison to glass and metal designs from the competition, it doesn’t feel cheap in any way. It feels solid in hands and thanks to the curved edges on the rear, it fits well. Despite the large 6.4 footprints, the phone is easily usable with one hand, however, the fingerprint sensor is slightly hard to reach. It is slim and narrow and doesn’t feel heavy in hands either. Since the back is plastic, it attracts fingerprint easily and is hard to keep the device clean. We get an Infinity U design with a Waterdrop like notch at the top making up for a good gaming and media experience.

Moving to placements, up front we have an 8MP front-facing camera placed in the Waterdrop notch, the usual set of sensors, and the capacitive buttons are present within the display. On the right, you have the power and volume rocker buttons which are tactile and offer good feedback. While on the left, there is a SIM tray. The USB Type-C port, 3.5mm audio and speaker grill jack are present on the bottom. There is a secondary microphone on the top. The rear is where you find the dual camera setup, LED flash, Samsung branding and a fingerprint sensor. The back is sealed, so the battery isn’t removable. Overall, the build despite being plastic is not all that bad and we really like the effort Samsung has put in with the M20.

The Samsung Galaxy M20 sports a 6.3-inch (2340 x 1080 pixels) Full HD+ TFT 19.5:9 TFT display. With slim bezels and very sizeable chin at the bottom, we get a pleasant media consumption experience on the Galaxy M20. While we would have liked an AMOLED panel, the TFT panel isn’t that bad either. It offers good colour reproductions with bright and vivid contrast levels. The sunlight legibility is very impressive as we were able to access content on the phone with maximum brightness as well. There is an Ambient light sensor which when enabled automatically adjusts the brightness based on the surrounding-lightings.

The phone doesn’t have Corning Gorilla Glass protection, so you will have to be careful when using the phone as you might break the display if you drop it. The phone also includes the option to hide the notch and lets you select apps that you want to use in full screen. It also includes a Blue light filter which reduces eye strain by restricting the amount of blue light emitted by the screen. The viewing angles are quite good and the content on the phone is clearly visible even from extreme angles. The touch response is smooth even while playing games. Colours and text look sharp, thanks to the 1080p panel. Overall, the display of the Galaxy M20 is very impressive and does a good job at this price range.

Samsung Galaxy M20 is powered by the Exynos 7904 14nm Octa-Core processor with Mali-G71 GPU and 4GB RAM. While it may not the most powerful chipset in town at this price range, the performance isn’t all that bad. It could handle most apps including browsing, social media, calling, messages easily without any lag or stutters. It even managed to keep apps in memory, but with 4GB RAM, we suggest you clear out RAM for the active ones to run smoothly. The UI is smooth and the animations/transitions are smooth with no stutters.

Moving to heavy use, the phone did slow down a little causing slow response rates to tape, slow loading of apps and etc. The overall experience if you are putting the device to its horse will definitely not be pleasant since it is a budget phone, this is what you can expect. The chipset can’t really handle high-end tasks, and this will be a let-down if you have high expectations.

Moving to the gaming department, we played a wide range of games including PUBG, Asphalt 9, Nova 3, Leo’s Fortune, Hay Day and more. These games were playable only when the graphics options are to medium if not low. The frame rates weren’t consistent and we did notice lag in the gameplay more often than not. There are no heating issues even with slightly heavy gaming. The phone packs a fingerprint sensor and face unlock both of which are very responsive and unlock the phone almost instantly. Overall, the performance of the Galaxy M20 is decent but certainly not the best we have seen in the segment.

As for the optics, the Galaxy M20 features dual rear cameras consisting of a 13MP primary shooter with LED flash, f/1.9 aperture, and a 5MP ultra-wide angle camera with f/2.2 aperture. There is an 8MP front-facing shooter with f/2.0 aperture. The camera features Auto mode, Panorama, Pro, Beauty as well as Pro mode to adjust ISO, Shutter speed, focus, white balance and exposure manually.

Moving to camera performance, the phone can click good shots in daylight conditions, it can capture a good amount of detail with close to natural lighting conditions. Enabling HDR further improves the already acceptable dynamic range. Autofocus speed is good and it doesn’t lose focus that easily even if you move the camera quickly. The secondary wide-angle lens adds a new perspective to the image and the Shape Correction’ option in the gallery fixes the edge detection. There’s live focus mode but then it is done with software so the edge detection isn’t very perfect.

The low-light shots are strictly average as they have noise in them which makes the colour look washed out. The 8-megapixel front camera is decent, it can click acceptable to better images in good lighting conditions. However, the lack of front-firing flash makes indoor and low-light photos grainy. The phone can record 1080p videos and the quality is decent. Overall, the cameras of the M20 are decent at best.

Samsung skimped on the earphones and this has become a trend with most budget phones these days. You will have to shell out some more bucks on a pair for a better audio experience. Moving to audio quality, the sound quality when tested with the earphones we had with us was pretty good. The vocals were clear and the base was acceptable for our liking. The speaker grill is present at the bottom, which is optimal but might block the audio when you hold the phone in a landscape mode. The sound quality is good both from speakers and headphones. There’s no squeaking sounds or distortion heard when the volume is kept at a maximum. The default music player was able to play a wide range of audio formats.

As for the video department, the Galaxy M20 was able to play 1080p video with X264 format but was unable to handle X265 format. Thanks to narrow bezels and impressive screen-to-body ratio, we did have a pleasant experience watching movies and playing games on the phone. There’s no heating issue even when playing on 4G LTE. Overall, the audio and video experience on the Galaxy M20 is quite good. We just wish Samsung had included a pair of earphones in the box.

The Samsung Galaxy M20 packs a massive 5000mAh battery with support for 15W fast charging. Usually, we don’t see Samsung offering such high-capacity batteries in the budget segment but M-series should be an exception as it is the start of a new phase for Samsung. The 5000mAh battery lasts more than a day no matter how heavy your usage is. Our usual working day includes a bunch of calls, messages, social media browsing, navigation, listening to music and more. With this kind of usage, we managed to end the day with around 30% of juice left for the second day as well. At one stage, we did record a screen-on-time of around 9 hours on continuous usage which is incredible for a budget phone.

With heavy usage including gaming, streaming content, editing photos/videos, 4G browsing, the phone could last till the end of the day but needed to charge again to start the next day. In our video loop test, the Galaxy A30 lasted close to 15 hours which is quite good. There’s no idle battery drain, nor the battery percentage dropped drastically as well. Thanks to the 15W fast charging support, the phone took close to 2 hours 30 minutes to charge the massive 5000mAh battery from 1-100%. Overall the battery of the M20 is very impressive and leaves nothing to complain.

Despite launching in 2019, the phone still runs on Android 8.1 Oreo with Experience UI 9.5 on top which is a let-down. However, the experience UI is decent and it offers a host of features including a theme store where you can download various themes to change the look and feel. The UI feels light and fresh with an app drawer and has the ability to change fonts, icons and wallpapers. Since it is running on Oreo, there’s no support for gestures yet. However, Samsung has not announced when the phone will get Android Pie update which is quite disappointing. The phone doesn’t have a Bixby home which is present in most Samsung phones.

The phone comes with Games Launcher which puts together games from PlayStore and Galaxy App under a single roof for easy access. There’s one-handed operation mode that shrinks the UI down so that it is easy to use the phone easily with one hand, fingerprint sensor gestures to open and close the notification panel using the fingerprint sensor, multi-window, direct call to make a voice call by picking up and holding the device near your ear while viewing call and more. There’s Device maintenance option that lets you manage your device’s battery life, storage, RAM usage, and security. Apart from the usual set of Google and utility Apps, the smartphone comes with the Facebook app and Microsoft Apps including Office Mobile, OneDrive and LinkedIn. You can’t uninstall the apps unless rooted.

The phone comes in two variants; 3GB+32GB and another with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage. If you were to pick the Galaxy M20, go with the high-end variant. The RAM management is good; the phone could have the 5-6 active apps running in the background without any crashing. There weren’t any lags or hiccups as the UI animations and transitions were smooth and respond well. Overall, the software experience on the Galaxy M20 is decent, but we wish the company has launched it with the latest OS.