SAMSUNG Galaxy A14 5G A Series Cell Phone, Factory Unlocked Android Smartphone, 64GB w/Expandable Storage, Long Battery Life, 13MP Camera, 6.6″ Infinite Display Screen, US Version, 2023, Black

an amazing cheap alternative for an expensive smarphone
The Samsung Galaxy A14 5G smartphone is a budget-friendly device that offers solid features for its price point. The inclusion of 5G connectivity is a notable plus, ensuring faster data speeds and improved network performance. The device’s display is vibrant and provides a satisfying viewing experience for multimedia content. The camera system, though not flagship-level, captures decent photos for everyday use. The battery life is commendable, providing all-day usage on a single charge. The overall design is sleek and modern, giving the phone a premium feel. However, the processing power may not match higher-end models, and demanding applications may experience some lag. For those on a budget seeking a reliable 5G smartphone with essential features, the Samsung Galaxy A14 5G is a worthy consideration.

Good Price & Quality
Compared to top o da line sets these are eceptional deals, just not for peeps that are clumsy around water or otherwise rough on their handsets. These are pretty good phones for folks who don’t need phones that turn into lifeboats or iron out u’re lives, & anyway they’re only gunna be updateable for a limitted time! sooo blow u’r dough onna house or a transplant or sump’n of real need!

Outrageously, Comedically Bad OS
I needed to upgrade to Android 13 for work, and figured my best bet was something slated to go until 14 as well so I picked this out as a fairly cheap option. Since then I have had waves of negative experiences with the software on the phone, and today capped it off with something that defies logic.When first setting the phone up, I was informed my PIN was too weak, and now needed to be 8 digits long. Alright, a bit weird but I can handle it. Then it maxed out at 3 fingerprints instead of my previous phone’s 5, which has caused me minor grief because I’ve found that the fingers I chose to forego, index and thumb on my left hand, I actually used a fair bit more than I realized.Next up was the One+ UI, a disaster of an interface that took me hours to figure out how to bypass in favor of my typical layout. This comes packaged with an obscene amount of bloatware, and there’s a hardware-based warranty void if you attempt to root to remove any of those apps, which I will never use and only take up space on the device. Fine, whatever, I’ll adapt.Then it decided it wasn’t going to connect to my PC with a transfer protocol, choosing only to charge itself from the connection. This was the first major issue with the phone, as I frequently moved files between my PC and previous phone and now am unable to do so directly, making file management a pain. There was one option I had left to work around this, a thumb drive with USB-A on one side and USB-C on the other, so I could connect it to my PC, drop desired files onto it, then connect it to the phone and offload them. A pain, but a workaround for the time being.And then it decided it didn’t want to do mobile data after disconnecting from a Wi-Fi signal, requiring a full reboot to register that, yes, I do in fact pay a significant amount extra on my mobile plan for unlimited data and it should be using that. This would reproduce every time I disconnected from a Wi-Fi signal, until finally I opened the developer options and forced it to keep mobile data on even when on Wi-Fi.And then today I noticed the thing that finally bothered me enough to say something. I was transferring an album to the phone and happened to check the notifications pane, and it said it was charging the connected USB device. Let me repeat that: it was CHARGING A FLASH DRIVE. The drive was concerningly warm, and there was no way to disable it as the USB settings were apparently controlled by said flash drive. I checked online for any sort of solution or workaround, and found that this has apparently been the case since at least 2017 and Samsung has done nothing about it. This absurd misunderstanding of basic hardware is so far beyond what any QA should have caught, and if it’s been part and parcel of Samsung devices for SEVEN YEARS then I’m done with Samsung’s ecosystem. Y’all can keep your bloatware and atrocious programming; see how many customers it wins you.Editing this review on account of new developments; I now have grounds to take off the last pity star I was willing to give. The phone has started refusing to recognize its mobile data as an option every time it connects to Wi-Fi. I went so far as to order a new SIM card to see if that was the issue, but the symptoms have started to repro on the new card as well. Given that I use this phone for work on the go, this is absolutely unacceptable. One star, fix your useless OS.EDIT, 10/28: Somehow, the mobile data problem has gotten even worse, as it’s just decide to ditch its mobile data while on the road with no cause whatsoever, right after I rebooted specifically to reset the mobile data after a Wi-Fi disconnect.

Bulky and slow, but very cheap!
This is a decent budget phone, but I really wish I spent a bit more and got something thinner (check the measurements!!!), smaller, and with more performance. It does tick every other box though, I think this phone would be 10/10 for use as an Uber driver or similar. But if you’re even a slight power user, I think spending an extra 50 or 100 bucks would benefit you.

THE PHONE HAS A HEATING PROBLEM AND THIS IS FACTORY UNLOCKED SO WE CANNOT REMOVE THAT SOFTWARE FROM BOOT UP.