Skip to main content

Samsung Galaxy Express Review

Samsung Galaxy Express
MSRP $0.99
“You get a decent display, comfortable and attractive design, good performance, and speedy 4G LTE.”
Pros
  • As powerful as a Galaxy S3
  • Compact, lightweight design
  • Bright, colorful display
  • Long battery life
Cons
  • Too many AT&T apps
  • Low screen resolution
  • Poor speaker quality

When carriers offer a smartphone for free (or $1) on contract it often means that the device has some problems. It’s usually a warning sign to steer clear. That’s not always the case, though. Samsung’s Galaxy Express on AT&T is one of those nice, cheap exceptions to the rule. This compact 4.5-inch handheld has a lot going for it: good display, nice design, and decent camera. Plus, it runs Android 4.1. If you really want a smartphone but really can’t afford to plunk down $100 or even $50 to buy one, the Galaxy Express is worth a look.

Look and feel

The Galaxy Express is basically a smaller version of the Galaxy S3, and that’s not a bad thing. It’s light, slim, and comfortable to hold with a great screen. It’s better for people who have smaller hands or want a phone that is more easily used with one hand than the S3 or S4. Just like the flagship Galaxy S phones, the Express has a physical Home button flanked by capacitive Menu and Back buttons, a Micro USB port on the bottom, and the Power button and Volume rocker on the right and left sides. That placement can get a little awkward since it’s easy to accidentally press one of them while going for the other, but overall the Express is well designed. It also looks pretty good and doesn’t feel cheap despite the plastic casing. Under the removable back you get access to the battery, SIM, and microSD slot.

The 4.5-inch display isn’t exactly small, though it doesn’t make the phone itself feel huge at all. Instead, it feels more like a 4.3-inch, medium-sized phone; the extra fractions of an inch aren’t that noticeable, especially with a 800 x 480 pixel resolution. That’s nowhere near full HD but that’s fine for a handset that’s free. The Super AMOLED Plus display is at least bright and viewable in sunlight. Even with the lower resolution, icon edges are relatively sharp. Where you’ll notice the difference is in small text and high-resolution images, which can look pixilated. Viewing angles are wide enough that we didn’t notice any color or brightness distortion when playing games. At extreme angles the screen darkens, but in most use cases you won’t encounter this.

Android and Apps

As with all Samsung Galaxy phones, the Express runs Android 4.1 (which is 1 version off from being up to date), but the interface doesn’t look like Google intended. Samsung has its own extensive user interface/skin called TouchWiz. The TouchWiz skin offers some nice additions to Android and makes it a little easier to use for novices, though we’re not fond of the toy-like look or how it makes a few things more difficult (like creating a folder). We do like the toggles in the Notification shade and the timesaving features like Motion gestures. The feature set is just right for an inexpensive phone, even if it isn’t as extensive as the Galaxy S3.

Pre-loaded apps include a few from Samsung and a ton from AT&T. We appreciate Samsung’s MyFiles, the enhanced Clock app, and the MediaHub for music. Samsung Link is for connecting Galaxy devices with other Samsung devices, such as laptops and smart TVs and sharing the screen. S Voice, Samsung’s Siri competitor, is also on board. The voice prompts for S Voice aren’t as conversational as Siri’s, but the service is improving overall.

AT&T pre-loaded a lot of apps (12) onto the Galaxy Express. Some are necessary and useful, such as My AT&T, AT&T Family Map, and DriveMode. However, do we need two messaging apps (Messaging and Messages)? And there’s little need to pay for Navigator when Google offers that service for free; same with Locker. At least you can hide some of these apps you’ll never use.

Cameras

The 5-megapixel camera on the back takes surprisingly good pictures for an inexpensive phone. Outdoor shots are colorful and mostly accurate and the camera app includes several useful scene modes to help you get the best shot. Unfortunately, HDR is not included, so stay away from mixed shadow/bright light situations. Indoor shots have more noise and since the shutter isn’t very fast the pictures aren’t very crisp, especially the low-light ones. All of the resulting images are good enough for sharing online and on social networks, but they won’t look great when printed.

The front-facing camera is crisp enough for video chats and the occasional selfie and does a slightly better job of pulling in light for evening or night shots than your average low-budget phone.

Specs and Performance

Inside the Galaxy Express is a 1.5-GHz dual-core Qualcomm processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of internal storage. This combo scored 5,106 on the Quadrant benchmark, around the same as the Galaxy S3 and a little less than the Pantech Discover. Our hands-on testing matches this – we found the Express snappy and smooth when doing everything from reading email to playing games. Even with quad-core phones dominating the horizon, it will likely be several years before you run into apps that are too much for a dual-core phone to handle, and many of those will be games.

The 8GB of internal storage isn’t much, especially for media hounds; good thing there’s a microSD slot that takes up to 32GB cards.

It’s light, slim, and comfortable to hold with a great screen.

Connectivity includes Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, DLNA, NFC, and GPS. The Express is a quad-band GSM world phone with LTE capability. We saw very good speeds on LTE in New York City. SpeedTest.net recorded download speeds in excess of 20Mbps and upload speeds around 12Mbps even when the phone only showed three or four bars.

Call quality on our end was very clear through the earpiece. Whether talking to people on landlines or cell phones their voices came through sans static and we didn’t experience any dropped calls. Our voice didn’t always come through clearly on the other end, especially with medium background noise. The speaker on the back pumped loud volume for speaker calls and music, though the quality is tinnier and harsher than we’d like.

Battery Life

Since the 2,000mAh battery doesn’t have to power a high-resolution screen it’s no surprise that battery life is great. Even with heavy usage, we were able to get over 12 hours of use out of the Express without employing any battery saving tricks. This included long gaming sessions, watching video, talking for an hour, and lots of background downloading from email and social networking apps.

Conclusion

For a $1 smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy Express is fantastic. You get a decent display, comfortable and attractive design, good performance, and speedy 4G LTE. If you’re on a tight budget and really need to get a phone for next to nothing, the Express is not a bad choice. It’s not as great as the Galaxy S3 (now just $100 on contract), but is definitely better than its price would suggest.

Highs

  • As powerful as a Galaxy S3
  • Compact, lightweight design
  • Bright, colorful display
  • Long battery life

Lows

  • Too many AT&T apps
  • Low screen resolution
  • Poor speaker quality

Editors' Recommendations

K. T. Bradford
Former Digital Trends Contributor
K. T Bradford is a lover of gadgets and all things geek. Prior to writing for Digital Trends she cut her teeth on tech…
Samsung’s cheap Galaxy S24 alternative is seriously tempting
Close up of the Samsung Galaxy A55 in yellow.

If you don’t want to pay out for the shiny Samsung Galaxy S24, but still want a great new Samsung smartphone, then the Galaxy A55 could be for you. It keeps the same cool design as the expensive Galaxy S24, but as the specification is more sensible (and there's none of the Galaxy AI stuff) the price stays low. What's more, there's a second, even cheaper new phone from Samsung to consider too.

The Galaxy A55 is the successor to the Galaxy A54, a phone we really liked, and that's why we are very tempted by the updated version for 2024. Like its predecessor, it comes in some great colors — Awesome Ice Blue, Awesome Lilac, Awesome Lemon, and Awesome Navy. Yes, Samsung really does call its color range Awesome. The phone has a metal chassis and a glass back, with a 6.6-inch, 120Hz Super AMOLED screen on the front.

Read more
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6: news, rumored price, release date, and more
Leaked render of Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6.

In the half-decade we've had folding phones, they have operated at opposite ends of the spectrum. One side wants to maximize power and productivity with tablet-like foldables, while the other wants to make your phone as minimalistic as possible. Samsung caters to both of these groups with its Galaxy Z Fold and Z Flip series, and it’s had five years of experience in that department.

We’re still a few months away from both the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Z Flip 6, but the rumor mill is steadily churning so far. Here’s what we know about the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6 so far.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6: release date

Read more
Best Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra deals: How to get the phone for free
Close-up view of the cameras on the Galaxy S23 Ultra.

Despite the recent release of the Samsung S24 Ultra, the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra remains a powerhouse smartphone worth considering. Right now is also one of the best times to buy a new Galaxy S23 Ultra, as it becoming a generation older has ushered in some really impressive Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra deals. You’ll find these deals scattered across all kinds of retailers, so we’ve done the heavy lifting of organizing all of them in one place. The best Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra deals include some massive savings through sales and trade-in credits, so keep reading for more details on which retail outlet may net you the most savings on a new Galaxy S23 Ultra.
Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra deals at Amazon

Amazon is offering a 14% discount on the 512GB version of the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, bringing the price from $1,380 to $1,199. That's a savings of nearly $200 to get the new phone. This version of the phone is unlocked for all carriers, so you have the freedom to use whatever plan you choose with it.

Read more