Comparison: Tecno Camon 12 vs Samsung Galaxy A20s

Samsung’s Galaxy A series is mostly a response to its previous misdirection in the budget smartphone segment and with devices like the Galaxy A20s, the company is doing a good job cementing its presence on the African continent where Transsion Holdings, Infinix’s mother company, has for a while now stolen its thunder. With the Chinese unrelenting, the stage is set for an interesting fight whose main beneficiary is the consumer.

The Samsung Galaxy A20 is one of my favourite smartphones this year. Having spent several months using one, I am surprised at how I keep going back to Samsung’s budget device, easily one of the best that one can lay their hands on when looking at the sub-Kshs 20,000 smartphone segment in the country.

However, good as it is, the Galaxy A20 is already old news with its successor, the Galaxy A20s having been in the global market for well over a month now.

Its newness means that it is yet to get its date with the Kenyan consumer but that should change soon. When it happens, it will be going up against the Tecno Camon 12 (standard variant) which is its closest match when looking at most of its features.

From the notch (the Samsung has that Infinity-V vibe going on, what Tecno would rather call teardrop) to the triple camera setup to the same battery unit, at least capacity-wise.

Where the Koreans opt to go with a Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset that will excite many that despise the Taiwanese MediaTek and its oft-berated performance chops, well, the Chinese go with it anyway. Does that have a huge bearing on the overall performance given that both devices have similar amounts of memory and their makers all take the long route towards Android customization? That is exactly where one’s choice of either HiOS or One UI will matter as they are all different and both have their highs and lows.

For instance, where Samsung can be lax when it comes to the consumption of system resources, Tecno’s software can be overly aggressive thus resulting in more battery savings. However, the Samsung should be able to make up for any such differences with its fast charging times (15W).

Of course, it is not lost on us that the Galaxy A20s, just like its predecessor, has a USB Type-C port to take care of its juicing up as well as data transfer, a boost for its users.

There’s also the small matter of the ecosystem buy-in.

It is unlikely that a Galaxy A20s buyer would be splashing over Kshs 10,000 on a pair of Galaxy Buds but that is an option on the table that we cannot ignore. No matter the A20s’ affordable pricing when compared to the more expensive devices on Samsung’s lineup, its positioning is meant to be an easy buy-in into Samsung’s ecosystem. That means everything from the affordable Galaxy Fit e to high-end accessories like its pricey watches.

Specifications

Which one would you go with?