Screen and design
Galaxy M10 does not go too far compared to other mid-range and cheap smartphones of Samsung with the body made of plastic, the back is the familiar Samsung logo and dual camera settings are arranged vertically. This makes the device look not superior, because the price of the device is quite cheap.
The right side of the device is the volume rocker and the power button, the bottom of the device is the Micro-USB charging port, 3.5 mm headphone jack and voice mic. A minus point on the Galaxy M10 is the speaker placed on the back of the device, which will affect sound quality, especially when placed on a tabletop. The sound quality on this smartphone is rated at an average level.
Galaxy M10 has a new Infinity-V 6.23 inch LCD screen with thin bezel border, giving a wide experience with a large display ratio. The device’s resolution is HD + (720 x 1520 pixels), although it can’t give a sharp display quality but we can’t ask too much from a smartphone in the midrange segment.
In terms of screen quality, the Galaxy M10 is rated at a good level when used indoors, but to be able to use it in outdoor conditions, you need to increase the brightness to the maximum. The ability to reproduce colors as well as sharpness is not appreciated on this cheap smartphone.
Galaxy M10 does not have a fingerprint scanner, instead will use face recognition to unlock. However, this feature is rated as fairly slow and inaccurate, even in full light conditions.
Performance and specifications
Galaxy M10 is equipped with an Exynos 7870 processor, 8 core Cortex A53 ,clock speed 1.6 GHz. Compared with those cheaper products from Xiaomi that use the Snapdragon 625 chipset, this smartphone feels a bit less “big punch” when it comes to microprocessor power, so to speak, and it is somewhat more affordable than them.
When it comes to storage capacity, Galaxy M10 comes with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. There is also a lower price option, with 2GB of RAM plus 16GB of storage. Samsung also has a dual SIM slot and a dedicated microSD card slot on this device.
In terms of performance, it can be said that Samsung has done quite well in software optimization as well as memory management. Although it only owns 3GB of RAM, this smartphone can handle relatively multitasking tasks as well as gaming.
However when it comes to gaming performance, the Mali 830 GPU on the device will make you feel disappointed when it provides poor graphics performance. Even at the lowest setting, PUBG cannot keep the frame rate stable.
On the software side, the Galaxy M10 runs on Android 8.1 Oreo with the Samsung Experience 9.5 interface, or well, that’s what it states. It also includes several pre-installed applications ,like Office, OneDrive, and LinkedIn. Those apps are there from the start and can not be removed or uninstalled, at least not like normal apps.
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Camera
Samsung’s new cheap smartphone is equipped with dual camera settings on the back, including 13MP main sensor and 5MP wide-angle sensor, the front is a 5MP selfie camera.
In outdoor conditions, the shooting quality of this device is not appreciated. The camera only recognizes the images when there is enough light, so the details in the dark area will be lost or maybe even blurred, kind of like that.
With a 5MP wide angle camera and a 120-degree viewing angle, you can pick up more scenes, and it is also good for group shots, in general. However, the quality of shooting in wide-angle mode is also not appreciated, the details are unclear and quite noise even in ideal lighting conditions.
In terms of low-light shooting, shots from the Galaxy M10 have high noise and low detail and are even worse when you switch to ultrawide mode. The phone does not have a dedicated night mode. You can use Pro mode to improve image quality, but actually the improvement is not worth it.
Meanwhile, the front camera with built-in smart beauty filter makes it smoother and brighter when taking selfies, but it doesn’t look very real. Overall, the camera is not a strong point of this cheap smartphone.
The battery
Samsung Galaxy M10 is equipped with 3,300mAh battery, a quite high number, enough to be used for a whole day. In the medium-brightness video playback test, the phone can last more than 18 hours of continuous playback.
If combining gaming, web surfing and other basic tasks, this smartphone can be used for more than 6 hours with a battery drop of about 5% in 30 minutes of playing PUBG. Galaxy M10 does not support fast charging and an average charge takes about 2 hours and 15 minutes.
Conclusion
Galaxy M phones are demonstrating Samsung’s efforts in regaining its position in the low-end segment. However, what the Galaxy M10 shows is not really outstanding if not far less than the products from Chinese firms.
Will that in the near future Samsung will continue to launch other tricks or temporarily put aside this segment to focus on the markets that are considered their forte, wait and see.
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Tech Reviewer & Product Analyst
Định Bia has spent over 10 years testing consumer electronics with a focus on smart technology. He work as a product advisor at Biareview where he helped customers find the right devices for their needs. He personally tests every product featured on this site using a consistent evaluation framework covering quality, durability, and value. All reviews are based on experience, not influenced by the manufacturer.