Best Cheap Phones 2025: Our favourite affordable handsets tested and ranked

All you need to know about the Motorola Edge 60 FusionMotorola Edge 60 Fusion Review is that if you don’t have much of a budget to work with but you value a phone’s aesthetic above all, then this is easily the one you should consider buying first. There are three Pantone infused colourways available: Slipstream, Amazonite and Mykonos, and they all look great. Plus, all that style doesn’t come at the expense of durability thanks to an official IP69 rating.

Stop staring at the phone’s gorgeous backing and you’ll notice that it has a similarly eye-catching 6.67-inch pOLED display. The screen does have a cascading effect at the sides which, depending on how you feel about these types of screens, might be a boon or a turn-off. If you want a flat display then you might want to consider giving the Honor 400 a look.

Despite what the camera bump would have you believe, there are actually two cameras on the rear of the Edge 60 Fusion, a 50MP sensor and a 13MP ultra-wide. The latter of these two sensors isn’t too much to write home about, but that main wide-angle lens snapper can do the trick with wonderfully vibrant shots on a sunny day.

Even though it feels incredibly light in the hand, weighing just 178g, the Edge 60 Fusion boasts a large 5200mAh battery which, from our testing, only dropped 6% after an hour of streaming Netflix. Pair that with super fast 68W charging and it’s hard to imagine you’ll have any complaints in the battery department.

Unfortunately, the one area where the Edge 60 Fusion really trips up is the feature that Motorola seems to be pushing the most right now: Moto AI. There’s a dedicated button to quickly summon Motorola’s take on artificial intelligence, but it just isn’t anywhere near as useful as Google Gemini, so it would have been nice to see Motorola focus its efforts elsewhere.

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The Nothing Phone 3a is the follow-up to the hugely popular budget-focused Nothing Phone 2a from 2024, and just like its predecessor, there’s a lot to love. It not only retains the iconic Nothing design DNA but new features that help it truly stand out from the competition.

If you’re looking for a unique-looking phone on a budget, the Nothing Phone 3a fits the bill and then some with its iconic transparent design, which gives you a good look at the internals on the rear panel. Like the others in the collection, it also sports the Glyph interface that flashes in time to ringtones and texts and doubles up as a handy camera timer.

Still, the most important aspect of the Phone 3a is the tech, and Nothing has excelled once again. The 6.7-inch 120Hz AMOLED screen is bright and accurate, with a whopping 3000nits peak brightness when watching HDR10+ content and an impressive 1300nits in regular high-brightness mode.

That’s flanked by a triple camera setup comprised of a 50MP wide, 8MP ultrawide and, rather surprisingly, a 50MP 2x telephoto lens.

The latter is still rare at the price point, and while it can’t quite compete with the periscope lens of the more premium Nothing Phone 3a Pro, it delivers excellent results in daylight. The 50MP main is similarly capable, though it performs way better in low-light scenarios. The ultrawide has taken a hit, dropping down from 50MP on the previous generation and it’s easily the weakest of the trio as a result, but it’ll still take a decent wide-angle shot.

That’s backed up by the Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 which allows it to outperform the competition in tests, and a 5000mAh battery delivers all-day battery life. There’s also the dot-matrix-inspired Nothing OS to appreciate, complete with Nothing’s new Essential Space, essentially its own spin on AI with some pretty handy features.

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The Motorola Edge 50 Neo is similar to the Edge 50 Fusion in many regards; it’s similarly thin and lightweight, at 8.1mm thick and 171g, and it sports speedy 68W fast charging, but there are key differences that make it stand out.

For one, it boasts a range of Pantone-certified colour options with the Pantone logo clear for everyone to see on the vegan leather-clad rear. These give the phones a distinctive look not only compared to the Fusion, but most other budget-friendly phones.

Most importantly, however, the Edge 50 Neo offers a surprisingly capable camera setup comprised of a 50MP main, 13MP ultrawide, and 10MP 3x telephoto, the latter of which is rarely seen at the price point. Performance is solid from the main sensor, which is able to handle both well-lit and low-light scenarios with ease. The auxiliary lenses don’t quite match up, but the ability to get closer to the action with the 3x sensor is very much appreciated.

Elsewhere, the Edge 50 Neo is a fairly compact device with a 6.4-inch OLED screen that makes it easy to use one-handed, though it’s equally not as well suited for gaming and binging as larger alternatives. It also means that it has a slightly smaller 4310mAh battery than the standard 5000mAh we see in 2025, though it’s more than enough to power the smaller display and get through a day unaided.

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The Poco X7 Pro delivers proper flagship-level performance that’s perfect for gaming without the associated price tag. That’s down to the use of the Dimensity 8400-Ultra, which sits just under MediaTek’s flagship 9000 series chips, complete with either 8- or 12GB of RAM.

Combined, the phone is slick and fast in daily use, and it can also handle demanding 3D games like CoD Mobile for extended periods with a large liquid cooling system under the hood. Gaming-specific software features allow access to common settings from within games to boost that experience further.

That’s paired with a bright, vivid 6.67-inch AMOLED display that’s more than large enough to game on, and the super-smooth 120Hz refresh rate helps things feel more responsive still. It’s also fairly high-res at 1.5K, and the screen is completely flat.

The phone’s gaming focus is completed by a massive 6000mAh battery that easily lasts a day, if not two days, depending on what you’re up to. Considering 30 minutes of gaming used just 5%, you’ll be able to game to your heart’s content. And, with 90W fast charge support, it’ll get a full recharge in under an hour.

There are weak points, of course; the dual 50MP main and 8MP ultrawide lenses are nothing to get excited about, and Xiaomi’s HyperOS 2 is both full of bloatware and about as far from stock Android as you can get. However, if you care about performance above all else, it’s the ideal cheap option.

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The CMF Phone 2 Pro is a follow-up to the Nothing sub-brand’s original CMF Phone, and it fixed most of our complaints about the original modular phone.

With a modular design, the CMF Phone 2 Pro is one of the more unique offerings in the budget smartphone market. Though you can no longer easily replace the back panel, the Accessory Point returns, allowing you to attach lanyards, kickstands and more.

You can also add new macro and fisheye lenses to the new triple camera setup, transforming the look and feel of your photos.

Modular design aside, the CMF Phone 2 Pro offers a surprisingly rounded experience.

The 6.67-inch AMOLED display has a 120Hz refresh rate and a boosted 3000 nits of peak brightness. Arguably more importantly, the screen can now display over a billion colours with 10-bit colour support, reducing banding and providing more accurate colours overall.

The single 50MP camera was arguably the weakest area of the original CMF Phone, but with a combination of 50MP main, 50MP 3x telephoto and 8MP ultrawide lenses, the CMF Phone 2 Pro is wholly more capable. Don’t expect flagship-level performance, but there is a notable jump.

Throw in a boosted Dimensity 7300 Pro processor, a 5000mAh battery with enough juice to last two days, and Nothing’s charming Nothing OS 3.2, and you’ve got a stand-out budget smartphone.

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What if you want a decent entry-level phone for less than £200 that simply does the job? The TCL 40R 5G fits the bill.

The budget-focused device offers all the main staples of a solid budget smartphone experience with 5G connectivity, a good-looking design, long battery life from a 5,000mAh cell and decent (though not quite snappy) everyday performance.

There’s a large 6.6-inch LCD display with a 90Hz refresh rate great for scrolling and binging, though its sub-1080p resolution can make elements look a little soft. The main 50MP rear camera is capable of delivering surprisingly sharp images for the price, at least.

It might not be able to compete with more premium options on the market, but for the £199 price tag, you won’t find much better right now.

At its core, the Xiaomi Redmi Note 14 Pro is a great phone. Working in the phone’s favour is an excellent 6.67-inch OLED display. With Dolby Vision and HDR10+ support, not to mention a peak brightness of 3000nits that makes the phone easy to use outdoors, it’s quite amazing that Xiaomi has managed to cram all of this screen tech in at the budget end of the market.

The main 200MP sensor is also nothing to be sniffed at, delivering wonderfully detailed shots in the daytime, and still managing to hold its own after the sun goes down. Because of that high megapixel count, you do have some leeway when it comes to cropping in, and zooming in up to 3x still delivers decent shots, but you won’t want to go any further than that.

One thing we genuinely didn’t expect was an official IP68 rating, given that the grading was previously held back for last year’s Pro Plus model, but it’s still great to see it trickle down here. This means that you can use the phone around the sink and you won’t have to worry if takes a tumble in with the soaking dishes.