Best Budget SmartPhones of 2015

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In todays society, keeping on-line, even when on the go, is an essential for millions of people. While being away from Facebook won’t hurt anybody, missing important emails may do. But people don’t always have the budget to splash out on a high-end, top of the line smartphone. Some may have to look at the lower end of the price bracket.

But don’t despair! While you may be compromising on ultra-high performance, there are tonnes of quality smartphones available for a relative small price. For those willing to shop around, you may find you’re getting a perfectly suitable phone for a lot less than you expected!

Here are a few we have picked out:

ZTE Blade 3

Best Price: Argos – £49.95

  • Well built
  • Basic

ZTE are a Chinese company, who are looking to become one of the biggest smartphone providers in the world (they already sit in the top ten in terms of revenue). Their latest offering, the Blade 3, is well put together, but there isn’t much to it. It’s also noticeably slower in comparison to others on this list, but it is also cheaper than almost any other equivalent model.

EE Kestrel

Best Price: EE – £99

  • Cheapest 4G phone available
  • Poor build quality

Not content with only selling other companies phones, EE have now taken the plunge into self-branded phones with the Kestrel. It is a retooled version of the Chinese made Huawei Ascend G6, and is by far the cheapest 4G enabled phone available today. It has a decent screen and processing power, but the phone itself feels very cheap. It doesn’t feel like it would hold up well after a few bumps and scrapes.

Aldi Medion Life P4502

Best Price: Aldi – £80

  • Better than expected performance
  • Patchy display

Yep – THAT Aldi. The budget supermarket has launched it’s own budget smartphone! And surprisingly, it’s not actually that bad at all! Though it is at the bottom end in terms of price, it is comparable in terms of speed with all of it’s rivals, if not faster. It has a solid build, and offers more hardware features (two cameras, micro SD slot, dual SIM capabilities) than you may expect. It’s budget pricing only really shows with an ever so slightly fuzzy display, and poor default memory storage.

Nokia Lumia 520

Best Price: O2 – £49.99

  • Unbelievable value
  • Less than stellar display

The Lumia 520 is nothing short of a revelation. While it may lack 4G connectivity, and it’s screen isn’t the crispiest, for around £50 there really is no beating it. Smooth streaming, 1000s of apps, and a more robust operating system than most phones in this range offer (namely Windows), you really will be hard pressed to think of a reason not to get one. That’s before we get to it’s best feature – customisable hardware. It has a removeable battery, and upgradable storage. So your 8GB phone can jump up to 64GB. Unreal.

 Motorola Moto G

Best Price: Amazon – £129

  • Best of everything
  • Slightly more expensive

We’ll finish with the phone that, as of right now, is seen industry wide as the best compromise between price and performance. A powerful processor, good camera, and great screen & build quality all combine to make this a no-brainer for those willing to breach the £100 budget ceiling. It also boasts the latest Android operating system, and access to a massive range of apps, from games to productivity. While the battery life is slightly disappointing, and the styling won’t be for everyone, the Moto G raises the bar for budget smartphones.