The Samsung Galaxy A27 5G is here, and it asks you to pay more for a little less in one key spot. Samsung’s new budget phone costs $350. That is a $50 jump over last year’s $300 Galaxy A26. The upgrades are real but modest, and one spec actually moved backward.
What’s new
Start with the good. The 6.7-inch Super AMOLED screen now runs at 120Hz. It also swaps the old notch for a cleaner hole-punch cutout that houses a 12MP selfie camera. Inside, a Snapdragon 6 Gen 3 chip brings a modest GPU bump. Samsung also pushes its “Awesome Intelligence” features down to this tier. That includes multi-object Circle to Search and 22-language live translation. Better still, the A27 promises six years of OS updates and six years of security patches, which is generous at this price.
What stayed the same, and what got worse
Plenty carries over untouched. The 50MP main camera with OIS, the 5MP ultra-wide, the 5000mAh battery, and 25W charging all return unchanged. So do the 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, expandable by microSD. The real sticking point is durability. Samsung dropped the rating from the A26’s IP67 to IP64. In plain terms, the A27 shrugs off splashes but is no longer rated to survive a dunk. Moreover, the A26 already carried an IP67 rating, so this is a clear step down rather than a sideways move. That is a strange thing to cut on a phone that costs $50 more.
Price and availability
The Galaxy A27 5G reaches most markets on July 3, with a US release on July 14. At $350, it lands in a crowded budget field. Rivals are not standing still, as the OnePlus N6 showed. Samsung’s long update promise is its strongest pitch here. The AI additions also echo what Samsung is rolling out on the Galaxy S25, just further down the ladder. For now, that long update promise has to carry the value argument. Even so, whether buyers accept a higher price and weaker water resistance is the real question.
