Samsung Galaxy A35 review: Durable design with good camera

Samsung earlier in month launched the new Galaxy A35 along with Galaxy A55 series phones in India.

The Galaxy A35 comes with a significant upgrade in terms of build quality, camera and processor over the 2023-series model Galaxy A34. The latter was one of the best-selling devices for Samsung in 2023.

I used the Galaxy A35 for close to a week and here are my thoughts on Samsung's latest phone.

Design, build quality and display

The new Galaxy A35 retains the design elements of the predecessor but comes with improved build quality.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

It features three vertically aligned three camera islands with LED flash in the top left corner. And, on the front, it has a high-quality flat display panel with a thin bezel around the edges.

The Galaxy A35 boasts a sturdy frame and Corning Gorilla Glass Victus+ shield on both the front and back panel, a first for the Galaxy A series phone to date. This ensures the device lasts long and survives accidental drops on the floor. Also, it is protected against scratches when kept with coins, keys or pens in the backpack or a tight pant pocket.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

Add to that, the Galaxy A35 comes with an IP67 rating. It can survive an accidental drop into the water for up to 1 metre (around three feet) depth for close to 30 minutes.

The display on the Galaxy A35 is one of the best in its class. One can notice how good the device's screen is while watching videos outdoors. It boasts a Vision Booster feature. It enables the device to increase the brightness to the max (1000 nits) when it is being used under direct sunlight, to ensure clear viewing of content.

It features a 6.6-inch full HD+ super AMOLED display with 84.8 per cent screen-to-body ratio.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

With 120Hz screen refresh rate capability, Galaxy A35 delivers a smooth browsing experience; be it searching for information on the internet or scrolling on social media platforms, the device's display works buttery smooth.

The Galaxy A35 features an in-display fingerprint sensor. It works fine with less false rejection rate unless the finger is sweaty. The finger has to be kept dry and clean for the biometric sensor to recognise it correctly and unlock the screen instantly.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

Samsung offers the device in three colours--awesome iceblue, awesome navy and awesome lilac. Our review unit is the latter.

Performance

The new Galaxy A35 comes with a 5nm Exynos 1380 octa-core (2.4 GHz Cortex-A78 x 4 cores + 2.0 GHz Cortex-A55 x 4 cores) processor with 8GB RAM, 128GB/256GB storage, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/6, Bluetooth 5.3

It works fine with regular day-to-day tasks. While gaming, it was able to deliver smooth performance but lacked efficient thermal dissipation.

It should be noted that this issue is more pronounced when playing or streaming content outdoors and solely depends on cellular data. Most phones made with metal and glass exhibit this behaviour.

However, when used indoors with Wi-Fi internet connectivity, the device does not get overheated.

It runs on Android 14-based OneUI 6.1 OS. It comes with a lot of third-party apps in addition to Samsung's proprietary apps such as Health app, Wearable and more. However, customers can delete any unwanted pre-loaded apps.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

Samsung has confirmed to offer a minimum of four years of Android updates. This ensures the device can remain up to date with the latest features up to 2028 and the customer need not have to replace the device after a year or two; instead, use it for a longer duration and save money.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

Add to that, Samsung is offering proprietary multi-layer Knox Vault security and Auto Block features that promise to offer protection against cyber threats. It will be very difficult to install malware on the device and all the sensitive information such as usernames passwords, and photos are fully protected against hacking.

It should be noted that Samsung will be offering software security patches once every three months for up to 2029 to protect the device against any new emerging cyber threats.

The Galaxy A35 comes with a 5,000mAh battery. With normal usage, it consistently offered more than a day of battery life.

It supports 25W charging. The company offers just the Type-C-to-Type-C cable. The customer has to buy the charging adaptor separately.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample.

Photography

Galaxy A35 5G comes with a triple-camera module-- main 50MP (f/1.8, autofocus and OIS: Optical Image stabilisation) backed by 8MP ultra-wide camera (f/2.2) and a 5MP macro camera (f/2.4) with LED flash on the back.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample.

The Galaxy A35 takes brilliant photos in the daylight. Like all Samsung phones, the camera boosts the colours of the subject, particularly flowers and food. The photos look great with bright warm colours worthy to be posted on social media platforms.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample.

The close-up macro photos too look good. It manages to get minute details clearly on the frame.

With Portrait mode, the phone does an amazing job with a clear focus on the subject. The edge detection works amazingly well to ensure the contours of the subject, in this case, the cookie jar is captured perfectly with a blurred bokeh effect in the background.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample with portrait mode on. 

The Galaxy A35 also supports wide-angle photos. It manages to cover the wide area of the landscape pretty well in to frame.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample with ultra-wide-angle mode.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample with normal view mode.

Also, it has Zoom capabilities. It can capture 2X Zoom with almost zero loss of photo quality. It supports up to 10X digital zoom.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample with 2X Zoom.

With Night mode on, the Galaxy A35 does a fine job with balancing the light and darkness of environment. In the sample photo below, the phone perfectly captures the neon LED lights in a dark room.

The new Galaxy A35 come with video digital image stabilization (VDIS). it ensures still photos and videos are crisp and stable even when filming with shaky hands or while walking or running.

Samsung Galaxy A35's camera sample.

On the front, the Galaxy A35 houses a 13MP camera (f/2.2). It takes nice selfies. Even the video quality is good and on par with rival brands under the Rs 35,000 price range.

Final thoughts

Samsung's latest mid-range phone Galaxy A35 excels in four key aspects--premium build quality, bright display, photography and battery life.

Samsung Galaxy A35 series phone.

Samsung is offering the new Galaxy A35 in two configurations-- 8GB RAM + 128GB storage and 8GB RAM + 256GB storage-- for Rs 27,999 and Rs 30,999, respectively.

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