What midrange phone £250-350 (ish)

[div0]

Looking to upgrade from Moto G 5S+ which has done me well for a good few years.

Main features I can see being important:

- Continues to run smoothly with lots of apps installed, even after a couple of years. Not a fan of constantly upgrading.
- Good camera for general use. I'm no enthusiast, but do like taking photos. Main gripes are when the camera app takes several seconds to start up, or there's a noticeable delay hitting button to take the photo and it actually being taken. By which time the opportunity for a good photo is often missed. Anything from landscapes, wildlife, sports, kids playing, selfies, indoor/outdoor, low light, all things I like to capture.
- Good battery life. Don't mind charging, but do appreciate decent battery life.
- Fingerprint scanner, can't do without now.
- Storage, generally find SD card support is good for offline music/videos etc. Use Plex a lot.

Things I'm not too bothered about; gaming, particular brands, size.

The Xiaomi Mi 9T Pro has come onto my radar as being a possible candidate, but seems to be out of stock.

Any suggestions as to what I should be looking at? There seem to be dozens of options, so just trying to narrow down the list a bit.

 

[div0]

Thanks. That was one of the many devices I've looked at too recently.

I think my biggest problem just now is not having a clear list of the best devices available in the above price range, to then make a decision as to whether something like the 4a would be worth the extra.

 

[div0]

I do like the Moto G range and have had several over the years, I just wish they had something with better processor/more ram.

So many of the other options I look at seem to be hard to find in stock anywhere.

 

[div0]

Think I've narrowed the options to:

Moto G8 power - £219.95 (no NFC)
Moto G8 plus - £239.95 (ok)
Pixel 3a - £329 (no SD card, only 64GB storage)
Pixel 3a XL - £359 (no SD card, only 64GB storage)
Pixel 4a £399 (Price TBC, not released yet - no SD card but maybe 128GB storage)

I think I'm leaning towards either the G8 plus or the Pixel 3a XL, but just not sure I can live with only 64GB storage. Would ideally like something like G8 plus but with 6GB ram, but only options then seem to be primarily Chinese/Indian models which aren't available from most UK-based retailers.

Anything I've missed?

 

[div0]

Samsung a71? Just under £360 on Amazon.

I think we have a winner. Thank you.

Annoyingly it had been on my list but think I (incorrectly) ruled it out for using Exynos processor instead of Snapdragon, whilst also being a bit over budget.

Looking at the reviews the a71 sounds good and that price is close enough that I'm happy to stretch.

 

[div0]

OP - apologies for the thread hijack but my requirements/price point are very similar to yours so its all relevant.

Not a problem at all. I already hit the button on the A71 purchase.

Of the options mentioned since then, the S10 lite does look good, although lack of headphone jack is a minor negative for me personally.

The pixel 4a just lacks enough storage options for me. 64gb isn't really enough without any SD card support.

Happy if the thread helps you and others look at other options in this sort of price range. I'll update again when the A71 arrives in next couple of days.

 

[div0]

Enjoying the A71 so far. Haven't used it a lot yet, so can't give much of an in depth review for now. But main things I'd comment on compared to my old Moto 5G plus are:

- fair amount of pre-installed Samsung sw that I disabled, but easy enough to do
- screen longer and narrower than I'd expected, but I guess just a change in aspect ratio used these days
- screen looks good
- battery charges really quickly and holds it well, can easily go a couple of days between charges for my normal use
- in-screen fingerprint scanner a bit hit or miss so far. Having problems with both thumbs being reliably picked up, other fingers ok. Had similar issues on old phone but maybe not quite so bad

Overall happy with my choice so far. Will update once used it a bit more.