Samsung Galaxy A9 Pro review: A stylish smartphone with amazing battery life

PRICE: Rs 32,490

SPECIFICATIONS: 6-inch super amoled screen with Gorilla Glass 4 (1920 x 1080 pixels; 367 ppi), Octa core Snapdragon 652, 4GB RAM, 32GB storage + micro SD (up to 256GB), 16MP f1.8 OIS rear camera, 8MP front camera, WiFi ac, BT4.2, GPS, FM, micro USB, 3.5mm audio, 5,000mAH battery, 210 grams.

For a lot of people, the premium flagships are just a waste of money. Many just want a functional phone from a reputed (or known) brand that looks good, works well for all your basic needs, has more than enough RAM for multitasking, a good screen (possibly even phablet size), more than enough storage (with an option to add more) and a battery life that will last for a couple of days (maybe more). If this sounds familiar, that’s because this is precisely what the Galaxy A9 Pro is trying to address.


The 16MP primary camera offers good quality results. (Image: Flipkart)

The A9 Pro is a large phone —with a 6-inch screen, it towers over many others. Just a year or two ago, 5.5-inches would have been considered larger but is now mainstream. The 6-inch is obviously bigger but not by a lot, because Samsung has reduced the size of the bezels and the
chin. Bezel size is just 2.7mm which helps keep overall size manageable. It has a very premium design with the typical glass-metal sandwich.
You can get it in a choice of gold, black or white. The frame is aluminium with chamfers and a flattened mid section to make it easy to hold. Otherwise, it is typically Samsung with the oval home button (incorporates a fingerprint scanner), backlit recent/back buttons and metallic power/ volume buttons.

Samsung really knows how to make good amoled screens and their expertise shines through on the A9 Pro as well — although a relatively low 1080p resolution, the screen looks sharp, offers superb contrast, viewing angles and brightness. The screen will serve you well for everything except VR, for which a quad HD screen is needed to get the best experience. If you find the colours not to your liking, you can always switch modes from the display settings (adaptive, cinema photo and basic modes are available).

Coming to performance, the A9 Pro is powered by a very powerful (octa core) Snapdragon 652 processor paired with a generous 4GB RAM. This processor offers the same class of performance as previous generation flagships, which is to say, it’s plenty fast. The only hitch is, you can get actual flagship processor devices powered by Snapdragon 820 for cheaper now — with phones like LeMax 2 and Mi5.



If you want a really large screen smartphone from one of the top brands, A9 Pro is the best deal. (Image: Flipkart)

For the camera, the A9 Pro has a 16MP primary snapper with f1.9 aperture and optical image stabilisation. It offers good quality results but it would still be easily outclassed by something like the OnePlus 3 (which is cheaper at Rs 28k, has a Snapdragon 820, 6GB RAM and 64GB internal storage).

But coming to one of the highlights and the main reason why the phone is so large — the massive 5,000mAh battery. This is larger than many
power banks you can get in the market and combined with the efficient Snapdragon 652, delivers two full days of battery life. Even though it has a really large battery, you can charge it up fast. A fast charger and cable is included in the box: 30 minutes of charging will give you about a 30per cent charge while it will go from 0 to 100 per cent in about 2 and half hours.

Overall, this is a formidable phone in the mid-range and a great option if you want a really large screen from one of the top brands. If you’re OK about going with smaller brands, you can do a lot better by getting better performance, more RAM, storage and better cameras at a cheaper price.