Samsung Galaxy M30s review

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Introduction

With pressure coming on from all sides in the mid-range market, Samsung is looking to better its rather successful Galaxy A and M lineups to be able to compete with the great all-rounders from Xiaomi, Realme and other Chinese manufacturers. And not long ago (at the beginning of this year), Samsung released its first phones from the M-series. And since 2019 is almost over, it's time for a hardware refresh because apparently, this is how we roll now in the smartphone industry. Hardware refreshes are even more common than the ones in the laptop/PC market.

And even before we begin the review, it's probably safe to say that the M30s poses a significant upgrade over its immediate predecessor. Almost everything has changed under the hood with the overall design and display staying the same. Which, of course, is a good thing because the screen was the centerpiece feature of the original M30. We were pretty happy with the performance of the 6.4-inch Super AMOLED panel on the M30 and we are pretty sure this one right here will deliver as well.

As far as the rest of the specs go, the M30s boasts a newer, more powerful and more efficient in-house Exynos 9611 chipset based on the efficient 10nm FinFET manufacturing process.

Additionally, the battery has been upgraded from 5,000 mAh to 6,000 mAh and the same goes for the cameras - more capable 48MP main shooter and better - at least on paper - ultra-wide camera.

Samsung Galaxy M30s specs

• Body: Glass front, polycarbonate back and side frame
• Screen: 6.4-inch, 19.5:9, FHD+ (1080 x 2340px), Super AMOLED
• Rear camera: Primary 48MP, 1/2" sensor size, 0.8µm pixels, f/2.0 aperture; Ultra wide-angle: 8MP, f/2.2 aperture, 1/4" sensor size, 1.12µm pixels; 5MP depth sensor; LED flash; 2160p@30fps video recording
• Front camera: 16MP, f/2.0 aperture
• Chipset: Exynos 9611: octa-core CPU (4x2.3 GHz Cortex-A73 & 4x1.7 GHz Cortex-A53), Mali-G72 MP3 GPU
• Memory: 4/64GB or 6/128GB UFS 2.1; dedicated microSD slot for up to 1TB expansion
• OS: Android 9.0; Samsung One UI on top
• Battery: 6,000mAh, 15W charging
• Connectivity: Dual SIM (4G), Bluetooth 5.0, Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac, USB-C; 3.5mm audio jack
• Misc: Rear-mounted fingerprint reader, no NFC

The Galaxy M30s is somewhat different than the rest of its siblings in the family. It's the only model from the series being released worldwide as an Amazon exclusive handset whereas previously, the M-series consisted of phones manufactured in India for the local market. And with the M30s out in the wild, Samsung is risking the phone cannibalizing some of the A-series sales because at first glance, the handset offers more while asking less in return.

It's no wonder the Galaxy M30s is the top pick in our Smartphone buyer's guide this year. And it looks as if the M30s rights all wrongs from the M30 and potentially fixes almost everything we didn't like about the first iteration. So let's dive deep to see how the phone handles in real-life use.

Unboxing the Samsung Galaxy M30s

The phone comes in a rather thin carton box containing the user manuals, the USB-A to USB-C cable for data transfer and charging and the charging brick rated at up to 15W. There's also a pair of wired earphones instead of a protective case, which you'd usually expect in a budget phone's retail package.