Samsung Galaxy M33 5G Review: A mid-ranger that lasts for days

Posted on May 28, 2022 at May 28, 2022 by Er Md Tanweer Alam

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Samsung has been actively launching smartphones in the budget segment with a significant focus on delivering 5G handsets. As a result, we have seen a lot of Galaxy M-series phones that are 5G-compatible and offer some exciting set of features. And the latest newest addition to this list is the Samsung Galaxy M33 5G. The device comes with a price tag of Rs 17,999 for the 6GB RAM and Rs 19,499 for the 8GB RAM model.

With this, Samsung is eyeing to attract users by offering an attractive design and stunning battery life. However, is it enough to make it a worthy option to consider, especially when the competition is so fierce? We got the chance to use the Samsung Galaxy M33 5G for a long time, and here’s what we think of it.

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G review: Design

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G has a very typical ‘Samsung’ like design. At first look, the phone would look like many other regular Samsung smartphones. The smartphone has rounded corners and very less bezels for the front display. It comes in 2 colors and the one I have is Deep Ocean Blue. The color looks elegant and the back panel doesn’t catch smudges easily.

Even though the design is kind of a little boring, I like how the glossy back panel doesn’t register fingerprints even when my hand was sweaty.

The form factor is quite good, in my opinion. It is convenient to play games, watch videos, type messages, or write emails on this one. But I feel the weight could have been slightly more balanced. There’s a bigger battery inside that adds to the weight but this isn’t the first Samsung phone with a 6000mAh battery. There are models with such a big battery setup and yet very well balanced.

The right edge of the smartphone house has a power button cum fingerprint scanner and volume rockers, whereas the left edge of the smartphone houses a SIM tray. The bottom has USB Type-C charging port, speaker grille, and 3.5mm headphone jack. The top edge is left idle whereas the back has a simple-looking square camera module that houses quad-camera lenses. LED flash is just outside the camera module and there is Samsung branding too at the back of the smartphone.

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G Review: A responsive display

Even though the Samsung Galaxy M33 5G doesn’t offer an AMOLED panel, the screen gets quite bright under the blazing sun. It features a 6.6-inch Full HD+ display with a 120Hz refresh rate, and Corning Gorilla Glass protection on the top. There’s a waterdrop notch at the top, bezels are also pretty slim on the sides.

I do not personally like my phone/laptop’s screen to be too bright, so 60 per cent brightness level was apt for me during the morning time. However, around 1PM, under the bright sunlight, the screen brightness had to be at maximum to be clearly visible.

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G Review: Enough performance for casual use

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G is powered by Exynos 1280 SoC and supports 12 5G Bands. It comes bundled with up to 8GB RAM and 128GB of internal storage. There’s expandable RAM support up to 16GB. It also includes Power Cool Technology to control heat dissipation.

In my 10 days with the phone, it offered decent performance and was able to handle basic daily tasks like browsing the internet, sending emails and messages, clicking photos and more easily. But when it comes to multitasking, and constantly switching between apps, the smartphone lagged in many situations. The tough response and scrolling also felt laggy sometimes. The good bit is, despite running up to 15 apps in the background the phone didn’t heat up much.

The Galaxy M33 5G has a stereo speaker which gives immersive loud audio while you watch content on social media, listen to music or stream content on OTT. For security, the device comes with an option for fingerprint lock and face recognition. You can also select the type of notifications you want to see on the main screen- whether they be brief or detailed. There is an option called ‘Temporary Mute’ which is useful if you want to mute your phone for a certain period of time, post which it will automatically shift to sound mode.

Let’s talk about the software part now. Samsung gives Android 12 OS with One UI 4 skin on top. One UI is a simple and colorful Android experience as it comes with various customizations and personalization. The main problem is loads of bloatware in the form of a large number of pre-installed third-party apps. These apps can be uninstalled if you don’t want them but there is adware as well, which is even more annoying. The app icons are big in size and neatly placed with ample distance between them. All in all OS experience on Galaxy M33 5G could have been better.

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G Review: Are quad cameras really required?

The camera department is where the Galaxy M33 5G does a pretty good job, especially for the price it comes for. On the rear panel, the smartphone includes four cameras including a 50-megapixel primary sensor, a 2-megapixel macro sensor, a 20-megapixel depth sensor and a 5-megapixel ultra-wide lens.

The primary lens was able to click pretty good photos in day and low lighting situations. The photos captured pretty good details and the colors also looked quite real. The good bit is, that the photos never looked too punchy or saturated. The low-light camera performance was also quite impressive in the price segment. There’s a night mode that optimizes a photo clicked in less light. Overall, if you love posting photos on Instagram and Facebook, the Galaxy M33 5G appears to be a pretty good option in the price segment.

In low light conditions, we noticed that the primary 50MP camera delivers some good results in terms of capturing details, but the colours were a bit washed out. Ironically, the ultrawide camera captured the right colours, but the details went for a complete toss. The phone also has a Night Mode that allows you to capture more light, but the results still have noise, and the details are not well captured. The front camera does a decent job of capturing portraits in both low light and daylight. The edge detection has definitely improved with this smartphone, and it captures true skin colour with the right amount of detail in sunlight.

Samsung Galaxy M33 5G Review: Verdict

When considering a new phone, there are many factors that help a user decide. Their use case, budget, and at times, the brand name all matter. The Galaxy M33 fits the bill for someone who needs a big battery phone, more than the standard 5000 mAh, we see these days. The device can handle the daily basic tasks such as messaging, calls, WhatsApp, and has enough on board storage. This is also ideally for someone who is not too fussy about the camera’s other features.

But if your usage involves gaming, clicking photos and videos in different lighting scenarios and your budget is in the Rs 18,000 to Rs 20,000 segment, then this is not the right pick. Samsung’s own F23, or the Redmi Note 11 or even Realme 9 series might be better suited in those cases.