Samsung Galaxy A22 4G: Is a smartphone without 5G already outdated?

Samsung isn't really known for offering the best price-performance ratio, but with the Samsung Galaxy A22 5G, the manufacturer offered a decent smartphone at a good price. Now we had the 4G version in our test lab and were skeptical whether a 4G smartphone at a similar price would really be able to keep up.

At least, the Korean manufacturer made some effort in offering some improved equipment compared to the 5G version, such as an optical image stabilizer in the camera, an additional macro lens, and an AMOLED-Display. So if you only have to pay 20 Euros (~$24) less for this, it should be quite a good deal, right?

Well, there are several issues that limit the equipment advantage of the Samsung Galaxy A22 4G. If we start with the price, the 20 Euros difference aren't really a lot, and if you only search the Internet for a while, there are even some vendors who already offer the two devices at the same price.

Secondly, there is the screen. Yes, you are getting AMOLED at 90 Hz here, although at this point this isn't unusual in this price class anymore. But the screen of the Galaxy A22 4G is very dark and only offers a 720p resolution, which isn't up to the current standards anymore at more than 200 Euros (~$235).

The optical image stabilizer is quite nice, and the macro lens also brings a bit more flexibility to the camera system. But why was the video resolution reduced compared to the 5G version?

We were also not very enthusiastic about the performance of the smartphone, since you get significantly more in other devices for the same price. So the reason for the Samsung smartphone appearing aged is not its lack of 5G but the lack of performance and the fact that there are more modern smartphones for the same amount of money at this point.

And this is perhaps also the biggest problem of the Galaxy A22 4G: at this point there are simply very good alternatives, such as the Xiaomi Poco X3.

This means that the device is targeted for a particular group of buyers: those who like Samsung and perhaps don't want to buy a Chinese device and who don't need 5G might find the smartphone very attractive.

You can find a detailed evaluation with a lot of background information, test results, and appraisals in our detailed review of the Samsung Galaxy A22 4G.