itel A50 Review: Affordable Android 14 Phone with a Large Display and Modest Performance

itel is widely known throughout India as a budget-friendly smartphone brand. The smartphone maker often releases devices in the country's sub-10K segment. However, the latest offering by itel debuts in the entry-level. With a starting price of Rs 6,099, the itel A50 is an ultra-affordable smartphone that aims to offer a solid value-added proposition.

Additionally, the itel A50 is one of the few ultra-affordable smartphones in India that runs Android 14 out of the box. But slow-laggy performance is often the bane of entry-level smartphones. So, let's put the itel A50 through its paces to find out if it is worth considering.

PROS

• Tall and Bright Display
• Solid Battery Life
• Stylish Design
• Runs Android 14 (Go Edition)
• Affordable Price Tag

CONS

• Unreliable Performance
• Slow Charging
• No Software Commitment

Design and Build

The itel A50 sports a mundane design, with flat edges, a shiny textured back panel, noticeable bezels, a waterdrop notch, and a plain glossy area surrounding the camera and flash modules. Our itel A50 came in Cyan Blue, although you can also get it in Lime Green and Mysty Black shades.

The mundane design isn't such a bad thing as the itel A50 is quite comfortable to grip with the buttons easily accessible. The phone has a volume rocker and power button on the right, the latter of which doubles as a competent fingerprint sensor. The phone also has a headphone jack and USB Type-C port on the bottom, while the SIM tray sits on the top left.

The itel A50 features a plastic build, which shouldn't come as a surprise at this price. And while there is no display protection, itel does include a TPU case in the box and offers a free screen replacement and a one-year warranty on the device. Another downside to the itel A50 is no protection against dust or water as it lacks an IP rating.

Display

Moving on to the display and the itel A50 opts for a 6.67-inch HD+ IPS LCD panel with a standard 60Hz refresh rate and 120Hz touch sampling rate. The screen also features a pixel density of 267 PPI, which isn't very sharp but is easily visible indoors. The display also has a peak brightness of 600 nits, which is just about acceptable for outdoor use.

The screen also has solid viewing angles, while reproducing vivid colours but lacks sharpness. While the itel A50 opts for a waterdrop notch, it turns into a pill-shaped bar to view select notifications. Overall, the itel A50's screen is quite respectable for the price, while the customizable notch is a nice touch.

Performance

For performance, the itel A50 is equipped with a Unisoc T603 chipset paired with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage. The chip managed an overall AnTuTu score of 149,891 points and a Geekbench 6.0 score of 215 points (single core) and 863 points (multi-core).

I found the phone does handles multitasking well, although it does tend to slow down or feel laggy when dealing with too many apps or a couple of demanding apps. It also runs titles like BGMI and Raid: Shadow Legends on low graphics, although the experience can feel sluggish. I feel the phone is better at dealing with casual 2D games and running 2 - 4 apps simultaneously.

Cameras

The camera setup on the itel A50 is basic with the 8MP rear camera and a secondary AI lens. Up front, there's a 5MP camera sensor for selfies and video calls. The main camera reproduces decent shots in daylight, maintaining a decent level of detail considering the price of the device.

The main camera takes some time to focus, and the shutter speed can feel a bit sluggish. While the colours are generally accurate, they tend to look slightly washed out. Portrait mode struggles with edge detection, and the skin tones often appear unnatural. The rear camera also struggled in low light and indoors.

On the flip side, the camera app did have a few useful modes like HDR, Beauty, Panaroma, and more. Video recording on the rear camera is capped at 1080p at 30fps, which is a good addition at this price point. Don't except any miracles from the 5MP selfie camera, although images looked sharp overall, despite the hit to detail.

Battery

The itel A50's 5,000 mAh cell will give you a full day of battery life under moderate usage. The 5,000 mAh battery is accompanied by a 10W adapter in the box, which takes little over three hours to fully juice up the device. For a phone meant to run basic tasks, battery life wasn't an issue for us, although charging speed could have been better.

Software

On the software side, the A50 runs Android 14 (Go Edition) out of the box with itel's custom skin on top. itel's custom skin comes with its fair share of bloatware, although you can uninstall some of the apps. The overall interface doesn't feel all that cluttered, with all the essential Android 14 Go features. However, it is worth noting that there is no mention of the itel A50's update cycle.

Verdict

The itel A50 falls in India's entry-level segment, starting at just Rs 6,099. The itel A50 is designed for those users who desire something simple. The device performs all the basic smartphone functionalities with ease, although more complex tasks like gaming or multitasking might cause slowdowns.

For its current price, the itel A50 delivers decent performance, a large display that is ideal for consuming entertainment, a solid speaker system, good software, excellent battery life, a reliable front and rear camera, and an attractive design.

However, charging speed and overall camera quality could be better, despite the price. We recommend the itel A50 for anyone looking to buy a smartphone on a tight 6K budget as it quite reliable as a smartphone for basic functionality.