Review verdict on the Samsung Galaxy A12 Exynos: Is Samsung bad at making entry-level phones?

Having already taken a look at the Galaxy A12 (SM-A125F) sibling model with the MediaTek Helio P35 in February of this year, the Exynos version of the A12 series has now also made its way through our test course. The Galaxy phone with the model number SM-A127F is very similar to its sibling model, but it's equipped with the in-house Exynos 850 chipset instead.

Although the installed Exynos 850 is slightly more powerful than the MT6765 Helio P35 in the sibling model, the SoC upgrade is rather limited. Unfortunately, you can't notice this performance gain in everyday use. In combination with the 3 GB of RAM in our review sample, the Samsung SoC provides a solid system performance at most. Application loading times are quite substantial due to the use of slow eMMC storage, and brief lags are commonplace, even in simple applications. The OneUI interface running on the Galaxy A12 Exynos also likes to take a break from time to time in complex apps or when processes are being executed in the background.

In our review of the Galaxy A12, we had already noted that the Samsung phone had a rather unremarkable look. Now the same is true for the Exynos version. We barely see any significant progress between the 2021 and 2020 models, so the Galaxy A12 Exynos will also have a hard time against the strong competition in this price segment. It's not only Xiaomi that offers more for the money with the Redmi 10 or Redmi Note 8 2021. Samsung, for example, also has a low-priced entry-level smartphone with a much better AMOLED panel and fewer shortcomings in its lineup with the Galaxy A22 in the 4G variant.

Are you looking for an entry-level Android smartphone at a low price? If so, you can get a detailed impression of the Samsung Galaxy A12 Exynos in our comprehensive review.