India is a price-sensitive market and will always have enough demand for affordable Android phones.
The segment is led by Chinese players like Xiaomi, Realme, Infinix and others. Even brands like Samsung, Motorola, and home-grown brands like Micromax have also started making their presence felt in the budget and entry-level price bracket.
It is expected that the increased consumer preference and shrinking price differences will drive consistent growth in this segment further. This price range has so far gradually inherited features from the mid-range segment, like better cameras, massive batteries, decent displays, and so on.
All the phones listed below are 4G-enabled except the Poco M4 5G, which is the most affordable one on the market currently. However, in case you like to see the list of more 5G phones, we've got a guide for that too.
Combined with affordable 4G internet packs, these phones can offer you great speed so that you could enjoy uninterrupted gaming sessions and binge on your favourite movies.
The phones priced below this price range are best suited for light to moderate regular usage as they come with chipsets that aren’t meant for heavy usage. However, you can easily find a phone with significantly huge RAM and a decent display for under Rs. 12,000. Also, these phones offer large storage options, enough to store heavy media.
So, let’s just dive straight into the options.
The Realme C35 offers a balance of good features, great performance and affordable price. Similar to devices priced below Rs 10,000 in India, the smartphone offers a 5,000 mAh battery clubbed with an 18W fast charger. Smartphones within this range are aimed at users who aren't too much into gaming.
Catching up with your friends on social media, making calls and your basic internet browsing are all met with this device. Surprisingly, the Realme C35 also comes with a good primary camera with a 50MP lens. The pictures come out good in well-lit conditions.
Here comes an option from Samsung for this price range. The Samsung Galaxy M12 is powered by a 7mm Exynos 850 SoC and offers a decent 90Hz display. The device features a matte finish which adds premium-ness to the phone.
The device also packs in a massive 6,000mAh battery and is paired with 15W fast charging. Further, there is a 48MP ISOCELL GM2 main camera, a 5MP wide-angle lens followed by a 2MP macro, and a 2MP depth sensor. However, you may not find the camera pretty decent.
On the front, there is a dew-drop notch that houses the selfie camera of 8MP. The phone runs on One UI 3 Core based on Android 11 out of the box.
Realme Narzo 50A comes as a decent and affordable 4G smartphone. It gets a massive battery capacity, 50MP rear shooter, and 16MP front shooter.
Under the hood, the phone is powered by a MediaTek Helio G85 processor with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage at this price segment. The phone gets a triple rear camera at the back with the primary sensor being a 50MP shooter coupled with a 2MP depth sensor and a 2MP macro camera.
It gets an HD Plus LCD display, a massive 6,000mAH battery capacity, and an 18W fast-charging via USB Type-C port.
Poco has launched multiple handsets this year within the M-series. The Poco M4 5G is currently the only 5G-ready smartphone in the country.
It runs on the MediaTek Dimensity 700 chipset and sports a 90Hz display. As a budget device, the smartphone can handle day-to-day tasks and will help you to test out 5G services without harming your wallet. As the 5G spectrum auction concluded recently, the smartphone does support many of the common 5G bands in the country.
While the camera performance is also good in good lighting conditions, the smartphone doesn't come with video stabilization of any kind.
The Poco M4 5G also comes with a 5,000 mAh battery that can get you through the day without a problem. It runs on MIUI 13 based on Android 12.
The Infinix Note 12 runs on a MediaTek Helio G88 chipset and 4GB RAM on the base variant with 64GB of storage. The RAM can be further expanded by up to 3GB virtually from the settings.
When it comes to the camera, it features a dual 50MP main and wide-angle cameras along with a 2MP depth and AI sensor. For selfies, you get a 16MP camera. It is backed by a 5,000mAh battery with support for an 33W fast charge. Other features include a side-mounted fingerprint scanner, Android 11 OS, dual-band Wi-Fi, headphone jack, and Type-C port.
The Moto G31 is the latest smartphone from Motorola that comes under this price range to offer decent specifications. It includes an FHD Plus AMOLED display, however, you’d only get the 60Hz refresh rate, compared to others in this segment that offers a 90Hz screen.
Under the hood, the phone gets the MediaTek Helio G85 processor coupled with the MaliG52 MC2 GPU. It gets 4GB RAM and 64GB onboard storage. The phone supports memory expansion of up to 1TB with the help of a microSD card slot. It gets a 50MP sensor, an 8MP ultra-wide-angle camera, and a 2MP sensor for taking macro shots. There is a 13MP front-facing camera housed under a hole-punch cutout. The 5,000mAh battery capacity gets 20W fast-charging support over USB Type-C.
The Redmi 10 Prime comes with a MediaTek Helio G88 chipset clubbed with 4GB RAM and 64GB of storage on the base variant.
Similar to other Redmi Prime models, this smartphone too comes with a 50MP primary camera and the performance is good. At the price point that the device comes, the smartphone is capable of handling most day-to-day tasks.
It comes with a large 6,000 mAh battery pack and can be charged with the 22.5W charger that comes in the box. It also runs on MIUI 12.5 based on Android 11.
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