Samsung Galaxy F62 First Impressions

Samsung is slowly but steadily expanding its new F-series line of Galaxy phones, which up until now only consisted of the Galaxy F41. The new arrival in the series is called the Samsung Galaxy F62, which is positioned at a higher price segment. The goal of the Galaxy F62 is to deliver a true flagship-grade SoC in the mid-range price segment and for this, Samsung has chosen its Exynos 9825 SoC from the Galaxy Note 10+ (Review) as the center-piece for this smartphone.

With a starting price of Rs. 23,999, the Samsung Galaxy F62 promises true flagship-level performance compared to the current competition. I've spent some time with the new smartphone and here's my first impressions of the Galaxy F62.

Let's start with the name. The ‘F62' moniker is supposed to signify a leap in features and performance compared to the Galaxy F41, although the exact reasoning behind choosing the number 62 is unclear. Then there's the similarities between it and the Samsung's own Galaxy M51, which also resides in this ball-park price range. We'll get to this in just a bit.

The Samsung Galaxy F62 ships in a rather petit looking box. Inside, you get a Type-C to Type-C USB cable, which is interesting to see in a mid-range phone. Samsung still bundles a fast charger in the box for its mid-range phones, unlike its 2021 flagships. There's no case in the box, which is a shame since the polycarbonate back picks up scratches very easily.

This brings us to the design of the Samsung Galaxy F62, which looks neat. The Laser Blue finish that I have looks striking, although the glossy finish does attract fingerprints the moment you touch it. It feels very sturdy too but it's also a chunky and heavy smartphone, measuring 9.5mm in thickness and weighing 218g. Despite the large width, the camera bump still protrudes outwards a bit.

The Samsung Galaxy F62 has an Infinity-O hole-punch cutout for the selfie camera

The display is a large 6.7-inch Super AMOLED Plus panel, with a hope-punch cutout, and a full-HD+ resolution. Out of the box, the display is a bit too vivid and colours are oversaturated for my liking, but you can tune this in the Settings app. The Samsung Galaxy F62 misses out on a few display features which is offered by the competition, such as an in-display fingerprint sensor and high refresh rate. You get a capacitive side-mounted fingerprint sensor (in the power button) and a standard 60Hz refresh rate. Samsung is hoping that its flagship SoC would make up for it.

The Exynos 9825 is no doubt a powerful chip and while we won't get into the performance aspect in this piece, since I still have to test it, rest assured there wouldn't be any shortage of power if our experience with the Galaxy Note 10+ was anything to go by. Samsung is offering two variants, 6GB of RAM at Rs. 23,999 and 8GB of RAM at Rs. 25,999, both having 128GB of storage. The latter can be expanded via the dedicated slot for a microSD card in the SIM tray. The Samsung Galaxy F62 runs One UI 3.1 which is based on Android 11 and the experience so far is similar to that of the Galaxy S21 Ultra (Review).

Another big highlight and a reason why this phone is so thick is the massive 7,000mAh battery. Just like the Galaxy M51, the Galaxy F62 should be able to deliver a proper two-day battery life. There's support for 25W fast charging too.

Rounding off the Galaxy F62 are the cameras, which once again, are very similar to the Galaxy M51 (Review) on paper. There's a 32-megapixel selfie camera and at the back, you get a primary 64-megapixel camera, a 12-megapixel ultra-wide angle camera, and two 5-megapixel cameras for depth and macro duties. Samsung has added few flagship camera features too such as Single Take, which uses the camera's AI to captures multiple stills from various lenses and automatically apply filters, create GIFs, etc, by just pressing the shutter once.

The Samsung Galaxy F62 has a 7,000mAh battery and supports 25W fast charging

There's obviously a lot more camera testing to be done, so don't forget to check back for my full review coming soon. Based on what I've used and seen so far, the Samsung Galaxy F62 seems like a Galaxy M51 with a more powerful SoC. This might be a good thing for those that wanted more performance but didn't want to spend much more. However, does slapping on a flagship SoC excuse Samsung from offering other utilitarian features such as a in-display fingerprint sensor or a 90Hz refresh rate? Let us know what you think of this decision in the comments.

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