| Pros | Cons |
| Good camera | Weak processor |
| Big screen | Bland design |
| Dolby Atmos support | Similar to lots of other phones |
“The Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus gives you a big screen on a budget and also packs in a few extras, but in most ways it struggles to stand out. It's solid, but doesn't rise above rivals.”
It’s not enough for a phone to just be cheap any more. There are so many affordable handsets vying for your attention now that it can take a lot to stand out and striking that balance between affordability and features can be tricky, but the Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus gives it a good shot.
This phone has a big screen with features to help you make the most of it, impressive audio for the price and more besides, so has it done enough, or should you look elsewhere for a budget handset?
Read on for an answer to that, along with full details of the Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus, complete with what it does well and where it needs work.
The Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus lives up to its name with a plus-sized 6.0-inch screen. That puts it just about in phablet territory and while there are bigger phones most of them also cost a lot more.
It’s a 720 x 1480 display with a pixel density of 274 pixels per inch. That means it’s reasonably crisp, though not pin sharp. It’s also an LCD screen – there’s none of Samsung’s fancy Super AMOLED tech here.
It’s a decent screen overall though and as well as being big, Samsung has also included a split screen mode, so you can run two apps side by side, making the most of all that space. In practice this can be a little cramped, but it’s more viable here than on smaller handsets and could come in handy.
Of course, whether or not a big screen is a good thing is subjective, some people prefer a phone that can more easily be used with one hand, but if you’re here then presumably you want a large expanse like the one the Galaxy J4 Plus provides. It certainly makes for a good budget device to watch videos on.
The most immediately obvious aspect of the Galaxy J4 Plus’s design is its colour scheme. Or, at least it is if you pick an eye-catching gold or pink shade rather than black. In those colours this is a phone that can’t help but stand out, especially with the glossy finish on the plastic back.
Colours aside though it’s a fairly ordinary looking phone. There are sizeable bezels above and below the screen despite there being no buttons on the front, and the back is fairly plain, containing only the Samsung logo and the single-lens rear camera, which we’ll cover below.
It looks fine, but could be almost any other phone. Still, at this price that’s all you can really expect. There’s also no water resistance here, but that’s another thing you can’t really expect at the price.
The Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus is powered by a 1.4GHz quad-core Snapdragon 425 chipset. That’s a fairly modern chipset but a low end one and it’s coupled with a basic 2GB of RAM.
The upshot being that performance is fine for navigating the interface, web browsing and using apps (barring potentially slow start up times on some), but won’t cut it for high-end gaming or other demanding tasks.
As with so much else about the Galaxy J4 Plus, that makes it roughly in line with what you should expect for the money but does mean power is one area where it doesn’t really stand out.
You only get a single lens camera on the Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus, but it’s a reasonably capable one. It’s a 13MP lens with an f/1.9 aperture. That means a bigger lens opening than you’ll find on many budget phones, which in turn means more light can get in, making this a solid choice for low light shots.
We don’t want you to get your hopes up too much here – it can’t compete with, say, the Samsung Galaxy S9 or Huawei Mate 20 Pro on that front, but then it also costs far, far less.
Low light performance aside this is a fairly standard budget camera, but it does have a selection of modes and tools to play with, such as the ability to add filters and AR stickers to images.
The front camera meanwhile is a 5MP f/2.2 one, which is a rather less exciting spec, but it does at least have its own flash, so you can brighten up your selfies. Not so long ago a front-facing flash was a rarity, but recently it has become quite a common feature. It’s still far from a guarantee though, so worth highlighting.
The Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus has a number of other features that are worth knowing about. For one thing, it has a fingerprint scanner, giving you a fast way to unlock your phone.
It also supports Dolby Atmos. You’ll need to plug in a compatible pair of headphones or connect it to a Bluetooth speaker to get the effect, but do so and you can enjoy immersive, 3D sound.
Finally, Samsung has also included its Dual Messenger service, which lets you set up two separate accounts for select messaging apps. Ideal if, for example, you have or want a separate messaging space for work and personal communications.
There’s a 3,300mAh battery in the Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus, which is a respectable size but not massive, especially when you factor in this phone’s big screen.
However, it actually lasts quite well, perhaps due to the fairly low resolution of the screen. Whatever the reason, you should be able to easily get a day or more of mixed use out of the phone.
For memory, you get 32GB built in, along with a microSD card slot if you want to add more. Connectivity options include 4G, Bluetooth 4.2 and NFC, so you can make contactless payments.
The Samsung Galaxy J4 Plus has a few high points, including a big screen, Dolby Atmos support and a camera that performs well (for the money) in low light.
Beyond that it also covers all the basics to a reasonable level, but fails to stand out when it comes to power or design. As such whether you should buy it really comes down to what you value most in a phone.
If you do like the look of the Galaxy J4 Plus though you might also want to check out the Honor 7A – a slightly cheaper handset that can match or beat it in many (but not all) ways.
