Smartphone Buying Guide: How to choose the best one

In our technologically-fueled lives, smartphones have snaked their way through almost every waking moment. Smartphones are being purchased by more individuals than ever, and the number of options is also growing. There are so many companies that claim to have the best phones which is not always the case! It could be confusing to select a smartphone from such a daunting list of choices, so we have created a guide that helps you choose the right smartphone for your needs.

Perhaps it's time to update your smartphone or help someone select their first one. The Redmi K20 Pro vs Oneplus Nord is one of the hottest topics nowadays. With hundreds of choices open and so-called best mobile brands, if you don't know what you want, selecting a smartphone is daunting. Also within a single brand or carrier, options are not missing. We're here to help you down with your choices by having a microscopic view at everything from features to cost, so you can buy the correct phone for you. For instance, you can check our detailed best buying guide for smartphones, but we suggest you check out our guide on how to select the right smartphone in 2020.

Smartphone performance: Processor and RAM

The part that is responsible for just about everything running on your smartphone is your smartphone processor, also known as the chipset or the SoC. It's basically the system's brain, and most of these processors are also equipped with AI capabilities that effectively make your smartphone today 'smart.' Even the best phones sometimes lack in this aspect which lets your phone lag after a few years of usage.

Not only does a capable processor allow your system to run smoothly, but it is also capable of improving other variables. Image processing is one example. As an example, Samsung phones come in two variants-one hosting the Snapdragon chipset (Snapdragon 865 + being the latest one). On the other hand, it employs Samsung's Exynos processor (the latest being Exynos 990) in the building. Some critics have specifically claimed that not only the processing capacity of the two models, the Snapdragon being much snappier, but also the image-processing capabilities, make a tangible difference.

So, it is important to know what processor you get along with it when you select your smartphone, as the output correlates directly with it. Snapdragon, Apple A13 Bionic, Exynos 990, and Kirin 990. are common. Apple processors are recognised for their raw computing capacity, and in the Android world, Snapdragon processors are the closest equivalent. You also have lower-powered processors that are typically used in lower-priced 2020 smartphones for mid-range and budget models, such as the Snapdragon 730 and 730G, Snapdragon 675, MediaTek Helio G90 T and G85, and more. If you're on a budget and don't mind losing some money-saving ability, consider using one of these processors to buy phones as they bring down costs quite a bit.

In terms of RAM, this refers to the device memory used by smartphones to store data used by active applications. The operating system still uses a portion of your smartphone’s RAM to keep it running. We're not going to get into the nitty-gritty of using RAM in a phone because it includes describing words such as kernel-space that in this article would end up taking up a lot of space. With ample RAM, you may have a greater number of apps running in the background, which greatly affects the experience of multitasking. However, some smartphones smash all barriers and install their smartphones with a whopping 12-16 GB of RAM. For smartphones, that's certainly overkill, particularly if you don't plan to move between 10-20 apps at the same time. You can easily get away with 3-4 GB of RAM if you're a light smartphone user, someone who only uses their phone for calls, emails, WhatsApp, and light browsing. Anything in the 6-8 GB ballpark is perfectly good for power users. This criterion is very important for selecting the best smartphone brands. 

User Interface

You also have to bear in mind that various smartphones come on top of Android with their own skin or UI (user interface). Samsung comes with One UI 2, which has improved by leaps and bounds from its TouchWiz days, MIUI on Xiaomi phones, which is an ad-fest but is well-optimized, ColorOS on Oppo and Realme smartphones, which is heavily inspired by iOS. OnePlus has OxygenOS, a clean skin that is very similar to stock Android, In order to see if it works for you, remember to try and experience the UI before buying the device.

Choosing an operating system

This comes down to two choices-Android or iOS. As both operating systems have a sizeable list of pros and cons, the option is probably more difficult than you think. You are Team Android if you are someone who loves tinkering around with your smartphone and customizing it to the content of your heart. You are Team iOS if you want a simple, powerful OS that gets regular software updates and is supported for a longer period of time. Android, though, is still just as powerful but not quite as simple, although it has become much easier to use the latest Android version than the Gingerbread days. Just know that, as an OS, iOS is, in some instances, quite restrictive. For example, if they are not available on the App Store, you can not sideload apps from the internet, the split-screen mode is still not a thing on iPhones (just iPads), you can not customize your home screen (although iOS 14 can include widgets), and you can certainly not use launchers to change the look of your phone completely. IOS, however, still has a plethora of perks, such as iMessage, FaceTime, occasional app updates, and the greatest of all, minimal bloatware, and no adware!

Conclusion

Last, but not least, as you intend to shop, you can remember the time of year. Otherwise, within a couple of weeks, your shiny new phone could be replaced. In September, Apple typically releases new iPhones, and Google's Pixels follow shortly after. Around February or March, most other manufacturers upgrade their phones, though this can vary. So if you have your eye on a specific phone, check when it's launched. You could be better off waiting for the next edition if it is coming up on its one-year anniversary. You don't have to do too much web searching to find out which phones are rumored to launch in the next few months.

It's a smart idea to buy around the time a new phone launches-you can spend big on buying the latest and greatest, or you can take advantage of the sudden price declines that will eventually be added to the phones that have just been replaced.

(Disclaimer: Devdiscourse's journalists were not involved in the production of this article. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of Devdiscourse and Devdiscourse does not claim any responsibility for the same.)