Samsung Galaxy XCover 7 Rugged Phone review

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: 30-second review

At the same time that Samsung launched the Galaxy Tab Active5 5G, it released this matching mobile phone that shares many of the style elements and some of the features.

The Samsung Galaxy XCover 7 is an affordable phone designed to handle being outdoors without being concerned that dust and rain might destroy it.

Like many of the best rugged phones we've tested, this one looks as much like an ordinary phone as possible, yet it has the impact resistance to cope with being roughly treated without immediately failing.

It’s also 5G capable, running Android 14 overlayed with the Samsung OneUI 6.0 interface, making it about as modern as possible.

For a branded phone, a price of £350 seems remarkably reasonable, but bear in mind that the cameras on the Galaxy XCover 7 aren’t on par with the S series phones, and it only comes with 128GB of storage.

However, the big selling point of this design over other designs, like the Motorola Thinkphone, is that the battery in the Xcover 7 is user-replaceable. Using only a fingernail, you can detach the rear of the phone and swap out the battery, and it’s also how you get access to the SIM slot.

In theory, multiple batteries could be carried to extend the battery life of the phone, should you need to operate away from civilisation for a prolonged period.

The only snag with this plan is that, like the Galaxy Tab Active5 5G, Samsung hasn’t released any accessories for the Galaxy XCover 7 at the time of writing, so it’s impossible to source batteries or any means to charge them externally.

Hopefully, Samsung will provide these pieces of the jigsaw soon.

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: price and availability

• How much does it cost? From £349
• When is it out? Now
• Where can you get it? Direct from Samsung or through an online retailer

Coming only in black, the Samsung Galaxy XCover 7 costs £349 in the UK and €359 in the rest of Europe.

At the time of writing, this phone isn’t available in the USA, where Samsung is still selling the prior Galaxy XCover 6 Pro for a hefty $600. We haven’t been told exactly when it will be released in the USA, but hopefully, it will arrive for around $350 at some point this year.

Compared to branded competitors, like the Nokai XR21 ($500) and the Motorola ThinkPhone ($399), the XCover 7 looks like a bargain. But it’s much less powerful than the Motorola, which is only $50 more.

• Value score: 3/5

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: Specs

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: design

• Easy to hold
• Removable rear cover
• Embedded SIM

Many rugged phones aren’t attractive. They have either been styled by someone who created props for failed 1970s Sci-Fi TV shows or those inspired by stealth planes.

Thankfully, the Samsung stylists who worked on the XCover 7 did much better than most. This slick and practical design is easy to hold and doesn’t try to oversell the robust nature of this product.

All the buttons are where you might expect them, it has a 3.5mm audio jack at the top for those who like passive headphones, and the flat underside with a subtle relief means the phone won’t easily slide away.

The XCover 7 diverges from the typical rugged phone because Samsung allows users access to the inside with a thin cover on the rear that can be removed without tools.

A small recess offers a lever point, and with a sturdy fingernail, the panel will, with a little encouragement, pop off. Inside are the battery and SIM card slots.

Our only reservation about removing the back is that the panel is remarkably thin and made of plastic, and we wonder how many times it could be removed and snapped back into place before the catches broke or deformed.

Are owners meant to have multiple batteries to swap out, or is it just a means to replace the battery when its charge is no longer sufficient? We suspect the latter.

The SIM card slot is another curiosity in that it only supports a single Nano SIM card and a MicroSD card for extra storage. The phone is sold as a ‘dual SIM’ design, but in this context, the second SIM is embedded and can be set using e-SIM technology.

Overall, from a design perspective, the Galaxy XCover 7 has the qualities that keep Samsung customers coming back repeatedly.

Design score: 4/5

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: Hardware

• MediaTek Dimensity 6100+
• WiFi 5
• Big screen

The XCover 7 was built with a mindset similar to the Nokia XR21. In that design, Nokia engineers went with a relatively low-power platform to create a phone that wouldn’t exhaust the limited battery life available for a weight of 240g.

But we weren’t expecting a Samsung phone with a MediaTek SoC, a brand synonymous with Chinese rugged phone brands.

The MediaTek Dimensity 6100+ (MT6835V/ZA) is an Octo-core SoC with two fast ARM Cortex-A76 cores to do the heavy lifting up to 2.2 GHz, and alongside those are six power-efficient A55 cores clocked to 2GHz. Sitting alongside the processing package are two GPU ARM Mali-G57 MC2 GPU cores and an LPDDR4 memory controller.

In terms of processing power and graphics, this is a lower mid-range SoC, but it is efficient. It also supports a 5G modem for those living in locations where that technology is available.

What’s mildly odd is that the WiFi technology here is only WiFi 5, meaning that data transfers over that interface will be capped at around 300mbit/s. Samsung’s own XCover 6 Pro supported WiFi 6 with triple the performance, much closer to the Nokia XR21 speeds.

Where this crosses an odd boundary is that the 5G modem should be capable of up to 2.5Gb/s, and that’s bytes, not bits, making 5GB substantially faster to download from than WiFi.

One striking aspect of the XCover 7 is the screen that Samsung gave this phone. The colours, contrast and clarity of this panel are exceptional. However, it’s only a 60Hz display, and 120Hz is the norm, so it comes with a few caveats for smoothness. The screen surface is remarkably shiny, which isn’t ideal for a phone used outside.

• Hardware score: 4/5

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: Cameras

• 50MP Main sensor
• 5MP selfie
• Only 1080p video recording

The Samsung Galaxy XCover 7 has only two cameras:

• Rear cameras: 50MP
• Front camera: 5MP

I'm not sure why some phone makers think rugged phones need less capable cameras, but Samsung has given the Galaxy XCover 7 less impressive sensors than it offers in its budget phones.

The primary sensor is 50MP and uses the standard pixel binning model to provide 12.5MP images with some degree of colour accuracy and contrast. The results are mediocre compared to the latest 108MP sensors or even some of the better 64MP options.

It’s not that this phone takes bad pictures. What they are is below the standard that even budget phones now achieve, and some of the Chinese-branded rugged phones are offering.

It also only captures 1080p video, but we suspect that this has more to do with the 128GB of storage and not filling it up too quickly than the capabilities of the sensor.

We’re not going to discuss the virtues or otherwise of the 5MP selfie camera, but like the overall camera offering on the XCover 7, it's underwhelming.

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7 Camera samples

Image 1 of 9

• Camera score: 3 / 5

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: Performance

• Budget SoC
• Lacklustre GPU
• Reasonable battery life

The positives from these benchmarks are that the XCover 7 lasts longer on its battery, and it’s comparable with the Nokia XR21 in some of the tests. But generally, it’s a notch down from its Nokia counterpart, and it’s a long way behind the more expensive Motorola design.

The GFX tests, in particular, underline how this isn’t a gaming phone in any respect.

Samsung has traded efficiency for performance and has assumed that its customers will respect that choice.

• Performance score: 3/5

Samsung Galaxy XCover 7: Verdict

 In terms of styling and feel in the hand, the Samsung Galaxy XCover 7 is an exceptionally attractive phone. The screen is big enough to watch streamed content but not so huge that it won’t fit in a pocket. It offers reasonable battery life, fast charging, and an embedded SIM.

However, the replaceable battery is mildly confusing as Samsung hasn’t supported it with extra batteries to buy or any infrastructure to charge them away from the phone. It seems unsure what the plan was there, but the same flawed thinking came with the Tab Active5.

The other significant issue is that the battery chosen wasn’t large by rugged phone standards, forcing Samsung to use an underpowered SoC to make the most of its capacity. Those who don’t play games or use intensive applications won’t notice, but the XCover 7 has the performance of a budget phone costing half as much.

We do hope that Samsung releases a Pro model with more power, better cameras and 5G connectivity in the same attractive packaging because the XCover 7 doesn’t live up to the promises the styling makes for this design.

Should I buy a Samsung Galaxy XCover 7?

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

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Also consider

Doogee S100 Pro

Using the G99 SoC and 104MP camera sensor, this is a much more powerful option. But those capabilities add cost. But you get a huge 22000mAh battery for the investment, making it last longer on battery power but also much heavier to carry.

Read our Doogee S100 Pro review for more information.

 

Lenovo ThinkPhone by Motorola

Another lightweight rugged design, sold by Lenovo outside the USA and under Motorola branding inside that region.

A more expensive solution that uses the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 SoC, 8GB of DDR5 RAM and 256GB storage.

Read our Lenovo ThinkPhone by Motorola review for more information.

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