I Bought a New $29 Smartphone! - Is it any Good?

Don't you lecture me with your $30 smartphone...

This is the Telstra Essential Smart 2.1 (Aka, the ZTE Blade A30) which I only paid $29 for brand new!

[Social Media]

[PO Box]
Daniel D
Parcel Locker 10217 40583
Shop 62 303 Grange Rd Findon SA 5023

[Revan-]

For those who can afford higher end phones yeah it would be kinda cruddy. But I'm glad phones like this exist where you can get them for basically nothing and no contract. They're crucial for people getting back on their feet, getting a call back for a job, emergencies, or for those who just don't have the money and need to be connected. It does the job.

[wertywerrtyson]

Replaceable battery, headphone jack and expandable storage. All things I wish more modern phones had.

[NourArt]

This is the phone everyone picks up in movies when they're on the run from government agents after being framed for a crime.

[diwaalejandrogalvez]

This phone has features that my S22+ does not: SD card, 3.5 jack, a charger inside the box, earphones, a removable battery, etc.

[hermitgreenn]

The charging port is all the way up there because to save costs, the phone only has one circuit board and maybe one ribbon cable for the mic. Having the port on the bottom would require a 2nd circuit board and another ribbon cable.

[rayphoenix]

The first phone I ever owned was a ZTE that was bought from a local service provider. They never tried to obscure the fact it was made by ZTE. They had the ZTE logo proudly displayed on the back of the phone. I got that phone in very late 2015 and I used it as my primary phone for everything until mid 2022 when I got an A53.

[laszlozsurka]

I disagree with the thumbnail. This phone can run YouTube, some basic apps and you can make calls on it so it's certainly not E-Waste. E-Waste is something that's completely useless and for $29 what more can you expect?

[marioysikax]

My first android phone was ZTE Blade, the very first one. They are not amazing, but if you have literally no money, value was through the roof!

[SpyroTheGerudo]

6 of the 8 phones I owned were like this. Only 1 viewing angle, cheapo cameras, precarious charge port spots, next to no storage at all, and more. This phone is nostalgic to the days I didnt make my own money XD

[ShahriarOcean]

This is what Apple users think every android phone feels like

[暇人-tj]

These phones nowadays are called burner phones, theyre used for texting, messaging, torch, basically a utility phone. I also have one and they serve their basic purpose, it wont lag unless you install a bunch of things😂

[kebab_boi]

I’m actually mind blown that this was filmed on the pixel. I thought u were filming from a special video camera. Pixel’s video quality is actually underrated asfff

[AMVS]

To be true this looks pretty cool 😅
I live in Brazil, is too dangerous to use your phone on streets because it can be easily stolen. A cheap second phone like this would be good to have.

[paulharrison]

ZTE is a respectable brand. ZTE was banned in America over security concerns but is allowed in every other country.

I have a £39.95 Lenovo Android 8 Oreo Go tablet. It has lite more efficient versions of Google apps like YouTube Go which actually improves performance. I use it for reading PDFs on a bigger screen than the one in my Samsung Android phone.

[FrostyPenguin]

FWVGA is an abbreviation for Full Wide Video Graphics Array which refers to a display resolution of 854x480 pixels. 854x480 is approximately the 16:9 aspect ratio of anamorphically "un-squeezed" NTSC DVD widescreen video and considered a "safe" resolution that does not crop any of the image.

[iSamYTBackup]

the calculation is basically voltage (V) multiplied by amperage (A) so we nees to round the miliamps to amps and 1 miliapm is a 1000th of an amp so 1000ma=1A so now we multiply the volts to amps so 5V x 1A you get the power of 5 watts and that is basically the bottom of the barrel of chargers

[ineophobe]

this is what android haters think every android is like

[ozzelot]

This has the vibes of putting Android 11 on a Galaxy S2 (a thing you can do).

Yes, you can go even further, but I just wanted to stick to the version.

[Richard-seju]

This phone is actually very good for some older person who only needs to call, text messages etc. It does this job just perfectly.

[MrSociofobs]

A $29 phone - replaceable battery, headphone jack, expandable storage, headphones and a charger in the box
Phones that cost 30+ times as that - soon probably won't even come with a box