Samsung Galaxy M32: Samsung Galaxy M32 review: Almost makes the cut

Samsung Galaxy M32 succeeds the Galaxy M31. The smartphone is dubbed as ‘BingeMonster’ by Samsung with the company betting big on the phone’s display. Samsung Galaxy M32 sports a Super AMOLED screen with 800 nits peak brightness. Samsung says that the new Galaxy M32 comes with the most powerful display ever on an M Series smartphone. We reviewed it to find out.

Samsung Galaxy M32: Design and display

Samsung Galaxy M32 is the successor to Galaxy M31. While Samsung Galaxy M31 had an ordinary look, Samsung has added a refreshing design to its successor. The Galaxy M32 features a plastic body with a glass finish on the rear side. The back of the smartphone is reflective. It features vertical lines running parallel to each other that emit rainbow-like colours when the phone is tilted sideways and upside down.

The handset is offered in two colour options — Black and Light Blue. We received Light Blue as our review unit which has a Turquoise-like finish. We really liked the design. Despite being glossy, it does not give that cheap look. Considering the price factor, the design is an additional highlight of the phone that deserves appreciation.

Samsung Galaxy M32 sports quad-camera sensors housed in a square-shaped camera module. It does not protrude much that can make your phone wobble when kept on a table or your desk. The LED flashlight is placed outside the module. Samsung branding is done at the bottom-centre of the rear side.

Another major upgrade that Samsung has introduced with the Galaxy M32 over Galaxy M31 is the fingerprint scanner. Unlike a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor on its predecessor, the Galaxy M32 comes with a side-mounted sensor. It is placed on the power button, making it more accessible and easy to use.

The smartphone has rounded corners. At the bottom edge of the smartphone is the USB Type-C charging port, 3.5mm headphone jack, speaker grille and a microphone. Towards the right is the power button mounted with the scanner and volume control button. On the left edge of the device is the SIM card tray slot. The earpiece for calls is placed on the upper edge of the phone.

Samsung Galaxy M32 comes with a 6.4-inch FHD+ Super AMOLED screen. The display has a refresh rate of up to 90Hz and offers 800 nits peak brightness levels. Samsung is touting the phone’s display as one of its major features. During our review, we find that the colours reproduced on the screen are accurate and crisp. We used the device for watching movies and online videos and can say that we had a good experience with vivid colours and adequate contrast at this price range. Having said that it is important to add here that the phone lacks support for HD videos.

Using the phone in broad daylight was easy, thanks to the adequate brightness levels. The phone automatically adjusts the brightness levels as per the surroundings.

Samsung Galaxy M32: Camera

Let’s quickly get done with the on-paper camera features on Samsung Galaxy M32. The phone has a 20MP camera at the front for selfies. On the rear side, it offers a 64MP main camera sensor. It is paired with an 8MP ultra-wide camera (123-degree field-of-view), a 2MP depth camera and a 2MP macro camera. Some of the camera modes available in the phone’s camera app are Hyperlapse, Slow motion, Food Mode, Pro mode and AR zone.

Talking about the selfie camera, there is definite skin smoothing in the shots. But thankfully, it does not end up being completely artificial. It retains the skin tones and textures in the final photos. The front camera also supports Portrait photos. The blur effect in the images is convincing and manages to bring the subject in highlight.

Coming to the 64MP primary camera, the sensor does manage to click satisfactory images during broad daylight. There is a scene optimiser in the camera app that helps capture the real colour and tones of the subject. The colours in the end images are crisp and vibrant. However, the shutter speed is not much of a help to capture moving objects, as there is enough blur in the images.

Macro shot

Portrait shot

The phone also offers a macro sensor which turned out to be a bit of disappointment. Images lacked detail and colours were washed out too.

The portrait lens does a decent job too. However, the ultra-wide lens again delivers average performance. There were fewer details at the corner and images were full of noise too. Despite having a Night mode, Galaxy M32 captures average night shots with minimal light in the result images.

Samsung Galaxy M32: Performance

Samsung Galaxy M32 ships with a MediaTek processor, and not Exynos or Qualcomm. It is powered by MTK Helio G80 SoC paired with 4GB/6GB RAM. The phone has a storage capacity of 64GB/128GB eMMC 5.1.

Coming with an entry-level processor, Galaxy M32 falls short in terms of performance. While we don’t say that the phone is slow, it is not fast either. There are noticeable stutters and lags that you face while using the phone on a day-to-day basis. This is mainly the case when you have multiple apps running in the background of your device. The performance is sluggish even when you open a new app or switch between apps.

The smartphone runs on Samsung one UI 3.0 which is based on Android 11. Like other custom UI, this too comes with multiple pre-installed apps. Thankfully, you can uninstall most of them from your device. A user will get app recommendations even while setting up the phone. But again, one can opt-out of these suggestions and make choices right from setting up the device.

There are some customisable options that one can opt for. Like one can choose for Home screen layout, lock the home screen layout and opt for Easy mode which basically means bigger on-screen items, a longer touch-and-hold delay and more.

Samsung Galaxy M32: Battery

The smartphone packs a 6000mAh battery. It comes with a 15-watt charging adapter out-of-the-box, although it supports up to 25-watt charging. Samsung Galaxy M32 takes about an hour and a half to charge completely from 0 to 100%.

Once fully charged, the handset can easily last about two days with moderate usage. This includes average hours of daily voice calling, 1-2 hours of scrolling social media, 2-3 hours of watching YouTube videos, listening to music for an hour and finally a little bit here and there.

Verdict

Priced just under Rs 15,000, Samsung Galaxy M32 is another entry from the company in the budget segment. The category is one of the most crowded and competitive with range of options across brands for buyers. With a Super AMOLED display, an elegant design and a long battery life, Galaxy M32 does manage to stand out. The 20MP front camera is another feature that works in its favour. However, the average processor may negate these pluses for some buyers. The phone competes with Poco X3, Moto G40 and Redmi Note 10 which are powered by more powerful processors.

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