As Android Central, we pride ourselves on knowing the best Android phones inside and out. Whether you want something simple and reliable or super-powered and loaded with features, all of the best picks are organized below for your perusal.
We’ve used every phone on this list and can tell you exactly where it triumphs and where it falters. At Android Central, our testing and review methods include making sure each phone lives up to the marketing claims of the company, offers good value for the money, can deliver a quality photo every time, and lasts long enough to make it through the day on a single charge.Â
Sometimes, phones have a special attribute that we test separately, such as camera tech or durability. No matter what you look for in a device, the best phones in every category can be found below. Â
Nick grew up in a telecom-savvy household and has been reviewing phones since 2011. Whether it’s waxing poetic about Nokia’s glory days or flipping open the latest foldable phones, he knows what makes a good phone and can help you understand which one to pick.
At a glance
Best overall
The OnePlus 12 looks and feels super premium, with a blazing-fast processor, ultra-fast charging speeds, and epic battery life. Despite the top-tier specs, this one has a fabulous price and years of software update support, making it the best overall value.
Read more below.
Best cheap phone
For less than $300 you can get a beautiful vision-friendly 120Hz AMOLED display, all-day battery life, and a processor that can actually run modern games, plus a camera that beats everything in its class.Â
Read more below.
3. Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra
Best premium pick
If you can afford it, the Galaxy S24 Ultra sports an ultra-premium titanium frame, four powerful rear cameras, epic performance, AI tools, and the venerable S Pen inside.
Read more below.Â
Best midrange phone
Starting at just $499, the OnePlus 12R features a beautiful and bright vision-friendly 120Hz LTPO AMOLED display, a powerful Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor, 80W charging, and years of support.
Read more below.Â
Best small phone
Perfectly suited for one-handed use, the Galaxy S24 also boasts the ultra-efficient Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor, tons of cool AI tricks, and seven years of software updates.
Read more below.Â
Best for parents
Google’s Pixel phones are great for many reasons, but the best reason is the camera. This one can capture clear pictures of your pets or kids no matter how much they move, and that makes it the best pick for parents of human babies or fur babies.
Read more below.
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7. Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5
Best foldable
The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 is the result of years of refinement, with a sleek, durable construction, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip, and a new and improved AMOLED cover display.Â
Read more below.
Best premium foldable
OnePlus blew everyone away with its first foldable which, subsequently, became the best premium foldable you can buy today. It’s ultra-thin, ultra-fast, and has an incredible camera.
Read more below.
Best gaming phone
Gamers, rejoice! The RedMagic 9 Pro features the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip and an internal fan that keeps the phone cool during the most intense gaming sessions. Â
Read more below.
Best overall
If any manufacturer gets the award for “most improved,” it’s OnePlus. The OnePlus 12 is the company’s latest flagship phone and it lives up to the hype in basically every way possible. As Harish noted in his OnePlus 12 review, “it took OnePlus a decade, but it finally created a flagship without any noticeable drawbacks.”
The overall design of the OnePlus 12 is similar to the OnePlus 11, but it still stands out when compared to just about any other phone on the market. In addition to being much more eye-friendly than other OLED displays, OnePlus included what it calls the “Trinity Engine” that lets you push all games to 120Hz regardless of whether they support them or not. That’s a huge upgrade from previous OnePlus phones which kept gaming locked at 60Hz.
The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 inside the phone is plenty powerful and lets OnePlus not only push the boundaries of mobile performance but also improve battery life. Both Harish and I got two days on the average charge and, thanks to SuperVOOC 100W wired charging, it will only take a few minutes to top-up the battery and get another day of use. Plus, OnePlus includes that 100W charger in the box, and the phone also supports 50W wireless charging.
You’ll also be impressed by the cameras which take genuinely good pictures and video in any lighting condition. They’re not quite as good as the Hasselblad branding might suggest — the more expensive Galaxy S24 Ultra and Pixel 8 Pro outclass it — but check out my OnePlus 12 camera review to get an idea of what to expect.
The only real “downside” is that OnePlus is offering four major Android updates with one extra year of security updates, totaling five years of update promises. OnePlus hasn’t always been as fast as Google or Samsung when it comes to updates, but five years of support is still excellent and ranks among the very best. Plus, even though Samsung and Google offer two extra years of software updates, OnePlus won’t charge you nearly as much to get its latest phone.
Best cheap phone
I used the Nuu B30 Pro for several weeks and was regularly surprised that this phone could somehow cost under $300. An eye-friendly 120Hz AMOLED display uses 1920Hz PWM at low brightness levels only, making it feel great to look at in any light. The build features premium-looking curves and a snazzy teal color on the back that is wonderful to hold and use all day.
The MediaTek Dimensity 7050 processor is surprisingly speedy, especially when compared to anything else in this price range. Plus, 12GB of RAM means you’ll never have trouble multitasking between apps, and the nearly bloat-free version of Android 13 ensures that the phone won’t get slowed down by garbage apps you’d need to uninstall right away.
Battery life was quite good and I had no trouble getting through a full day no matter how much I used it. OnePlus offers faster charging in this price segment but 30W is still faster than lots of other phones, including far more expensive ones from companies like Google and Samsung.
Plus, the camera is surprisingly excellent and blows phones like the Moto G 5G out of the water, even though those phones cost about the same amount of money. The only real downsides are lack of water and dust resistance and wireless charging.
Nuu promises 2 years of security and OS updates, which means this phone could potentially get Android 15 sometime in 2026. Two years of updates could be seen as a negative, but at less than $300, it’s uncommon to find anything better.
Best premium pick
If you want the best Android phone that Samsung has to offer right now, look no further than the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. This premium device boasts all of the efficiency and power found in the S23 Ultra with a few notable improvements.
This year, Samsung outfitted the frame with titanium and finally flattened the display. Couple that with the included S Pen and you have the best note-taking phone on the market. Plus, the display doubles the PWM rate and adds an anti-glare filter for better long-term eye protection.
The Ultra features the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy Devices chipset, an exclusive version of the Qualcomm processor. This internal hardware gives your phone enough power to handle graphics-intensive gaming without totally annihilating your battery life or dropping in performance. Plus, it’s got great new Galaxy AI features that work flawlessly with the included S Pen.
In most cases, the Galaxy S24 Ultra’s camera is better than the Pixel 8 Pro, an achievement that’s taken Samsung years to earn. But, as my Galaxy S24 Ultra camera review shows, it still struggles to take clear pictures of moving subjects. That’s particularly problematic for households with pets or kids.
Unfortunately, one of the S24 Ultra’s biggest flaws is its price. Thankfully, the best Galaxy S24 Ultra deals will help take the sting out just a bit.
Best midrange phone
It’s been very difficult to choose between the OnePlus 12R and Google Pixel 8a for this particular segment. Both phones are simply amazing, and the price tags help sweeten the deal even further. But I chose the OnePlus 12R as the best for four reasons, specifically: a better display, better battery life, faster charging, and better performance.
In fact, I’ve used the OnePlus 12R for a solid month and never once felt like I needed a more expensive phone. It does everything I need it to, yet doesn’t feel like I’m missing out on important features since the company’s OxygenOS sports the same incredible features as that OnePlus 12.
The phone’s camera regularly impresses me, even if it’s not as good at taking photos of fast-moving objects — like kids and pets — as the Pixel 8a. If anything, that’s the reason to choose a Pixel 8a over the OnePlus 12R if those types of photos are the most important thing for you. But the OnePlus 12R takes better portrait mode shots, captures better video, and has more camera features than the Pixel 8a.
The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor in the OnePlus 12R performs better than the Google Tensor G3 inside the Pixel 8a and it even has better battery life. Beyond that, the OnePlus 12R charges at a blazing 80W with the charger included in the box, so just 20 minutes of charging will fill your battery. Goodbye, battery anxiety!
Lastly, the OnePlus 12R’s display is just plain better than what Google offers on the Pixel 8a. Not only is it a true LTPO display with 1-120Hz capability — the Pixel 8a can only shift between 60Hz and 120Hz — but it doesn’t use PWM flickering above 30% brightness. Even below that, it uses 2,160Hz PWM dimming, or 10x the rate of the Pixel 8a. That means even people with sensitive eyes, like myself, can comfortably use the OnePlus 12R.
Best small phone
Like a few other flagships on this list, the Samsung Galaxy S24 isn’t a dramatic departure from its predecessor, but it’s a refinement of everything that made the latter phone great.
The Galaxy S24 boasts a compact 6.2-inch AMOLED 120Hz display and the lightweight-yet-premium device feel that we’ve come to expect from the S series. Not only does 2024’s smaller Galaxy S phone feature the same powerful Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy processor as its more expensive siblings, but it also comes packed with all those fantastic Galaxy AI features.
Samsung included the exact same 50MP primary camera, 12MP ultrawide camera, and 10MP 3x telephoto camera as the last two Galaxy S phones had, so don’t expect any kind of upgrade in the camera department unless you’re coming from something much older.
But, on the bright side, Samsung is now promising seven years of software updates for the Galaxy S24, so your phone will feel new even if you hold on to it for a long time.
Best for parents
Google makes some pretty good phones, but the best part of owning a Pixel is the camera. Taking pictures of your kids or pets is a joy with Google’s excellent camera software, which uses AI smarts to understand what it’s taking a picture of, giving you better results in the end. Our Pixel 8 Pro camera review will clue you in to what you can expect here.
With that AI performance comes a suite of AI tools that no other phone can do. That includes things like Audio Magic Eraser and Magic Editor, plus great new features like Night Sight Video and Zoom Enhance round out the photo-taking experience.
Video recording quality is better than in previous years. Video Boost further improves low-light videos by using clever cloud-based processing to add Pixel magic to your videos, making them look better than ever. Plus, the Pixel 8 Pro ships with a number of exclusive features like the Pro camera mode, making it easy to make manual adjustments with just a few taps.
Google’s Tensor G3 also comes with a brand-new 7-year software update promise, meaning your Pixel 8 Pro will see major Android updates until 2030. That’s a huge improvement over previous years and longer than almost any other Android phone. Plus, battery life has been exceptional and charging speeds are pretty snappy at 30W.
Google also made big leaps with hardware refinements this year, flattening the display (goodbye, curved glass) and rounding out the corners so the phone feels more comfortable to use.
And while Google’s Tensor chipset is known for its AI processing prowess, it’s not as good at anything else compared to Snapdragon chipsets. Plus, several of Google’s recent updates have been causing huge problems, causing us to demote the phone on our list of best Android phones. Like the rest of the Pixel series, there’s also no flicker-reduction display option, making this a tough sell for folks sensitive to flickering lights.
Best foldable phone
After years of refinements and improvements, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 feels like the perfect foldable for most people. Like the previous year, the Flip 5 features subtle improvements over its predecessor, but those improvements add up to something more than the sum of its parts.
There’s nothing quite like snapping your phone closed when you’re done with it. It sounds silly, but there’s a certain psychological component to folding it up and putting it away.
The phone itself is more durable than ever, too, featuring an Armor Aluminum frame and Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on both halves of the back. The phone’s cover screen has seen a substantial boost in size compared to previous generations of Z Flip models. Plus, the inner pre-installed screen protector has been refined and features better adhesive than in previous years, hopefully keeping protectors from peeling off over the lifetime of the phone.
Samsung also packed in a nice 3,700mAh battery alongside the powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip, the same processor found in the Galaxy S23 series and the Z Fold 5.
Best premium foldable
Just like any piece of technology, smartphones evolve and change as time goes on. We’ve seen screens get bigger, cameras get a lot more capable, and processors rival those found in computers. The next big thing for phones is the folding form factor, and so far, the best yet in this niche is the OnePlus Open.
The best way to think about the device is as a phone and tablet in one. When the OnePlus Open is closed, you’re treated to a 6.31-inch 120Hz AMOLED display that you can use for anything you’d like — checking email, scrolling through Twitter, watching YouTube videos, you name it. OnePlus made its outer display wider than Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold line and it makes everyday use so much nicer. Essentially, it feels like a “normal” phone when it’s closed.
Then, when you need a tablet-sized screen, you just open up the OnePlus Open to reveal a gorgeous 7.82-inch AMOLED panel with 120Hz LTPO 3.0 tech. It’s a lot like having an iPad Mini that you can fold up and take with you wherever you want, and if you ask us, that’s pretty amazing. It’s also a lot more eye-friendly than any of Samsung’s foldable phones as it uses a higher PWM rate and several eye-friendly enhancements, despite being a Samsung-made display.
And, unlike Samsung’s foldables, the display crease on the OnePlus Open is barely noticeable. Plus, OnePlus equips its phone with better battery life and faster charging. That means you can go for much longer on a single charge and take a lot less time to top it up when it needs some juice.
OnePlus’ OxygenOS is super customized for the Open, as well. There’s a taskbar on the bottom of the larger display, making it operate more like a tablet or laptop than a phone, and great multitasking features because of it. You can tap and drag any icon in the taskbar to perform split screen, or simply tapping an icon on the bar to open any app installed on your smartphone within one tap. Now that’s multitasking at its best.
Plus, you can pick up the Oppo Pen if you’d prefer to use a stylus. It’s a little on the expensive side and the Pen isn’t available on Amazon, but it’s not too hard to find if you look around the web. And let’s not forget the cutting-edge camera system which uses a massive sensor to achieve photo quality unlike any other foldable. It’s so good, OnePlus is using it in the OnePlus 12, as well.
Best gaming phone
Nubia RedMagic phones were already our favorite gaming phones, and the RedMagic 9 Pro ups the game in substantial ways. First off, the actively-cooled Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor inside is an absolute beast, and the Red Core 2 co-processor only helps things further by ensuring the most responsive touch sampling rates on any phone in existence.
That bright and liquid-smooth 120Hz OLED display is also quite eye-friendly with a low flicker rate thanks to BOE’s excellent technology. RedMagic bumped the battery size up by nearly 10% compared to the RedMagic 8, and fast charging speeds ensure that you’ll be powered up in no time even if you forget to plug it in.
Plus, an actual headphone jack means you can use your favorite pair of lag-free wired headphones while gaming, and the pair of 50MP rear cameras do a good enough job of capturing all the Pokemon you’ll be catching.
The under-display front-facing camera leaves a lot to be desired quality-wise, but since this is a gaming phone primarily, it makes sense for RedMagic to prioritize a way to completely hide that camera instead of leaving an ugly punch hole in your games.
How to choose
What are the best Android phones?
There are many contenders for the best Android phones, but we think the OnePlus 12 is the best option for most people. OnePlus has rebuilt Oxygen OS into something special and includes five years of promised updates to match. Excellent Hasselblad cameras on the back pair nicely with epic battery life, charging speed, and performance. Plus, the eye-friendly display is a joy to look at day or night.
If you have a few hundred more dollars to spend and want something even more impressive, the obvious choice is the Galaxy S24 Ultra. This phone is the successor of the outstanding S23 Ultra, featuring a flat screen and the best camera on any Samsung phone. Best of all, you get an integrated S Pen that lets you write notes, doodle, and so much more.
Folks looking for a compact phone with few or no compromises have a surprising amount of choices, which is a breath of fresh air compared to previous years. The Galaxy S24 and Pixel 8a are two of the best smaller phones you can get in the U.S., and folks who live outside of the U.S. and want a small phone would be remiss if they ignored the Asus Zenfone series. It’s a compact phone with a blazing-fast processor, a huge battery, and a great camera. All things that aren’t super common together in smaller phones, yet, Asus has figured out a way to deliver them all in one sleek package.
How do I pick the best Android phone?
Android phones have never been better than they are right now. So regardless of whether you can afford a flagship device or one of the best cheap Android phones, you can go out and buy a phone that you’ll be thoroughly happy with. Out of every single phone on the market, however, we have to give our top recommendation for the best Android phone to the OnePlus 12.
OnePlus’s latest flagship has all the essentials you want, including a brilliant 120Hz AMOLED screen, powerful cameras that take great photos in any lighting, fast charging, reliable internal hardware that powers through even the most intense gaming sessions, and clean software with five years of guaranteed Android OS updates.
What size screen should I get for my Android phone?
When buying a new Android phone, you should consider many different things, and it all starts with the display. This is the component you interact with more than anything else, so you must get one that you’ll enjoy using. Things like the resolution and refresh rate of a screen are worth talking about, but more so is the size.
Smartphones come in different shapes and sizes, and the biggest determining factor for that is the display. A 6.8-inch screen results in a much larger phone than one with a 5.8-inch one, and because of that, you need to know how big or small you’re willing to go.
Take the Galaxy S24 Ultra, for example. Of the “normal” phones on this list — that means a phone that doesn’t fold in half — the S24 Ultra has the largest display and, therefore, is a phenomenal canvas for watching movies, playing games, and browsing the web.
Basically, any content consumption looks better on a larger display because the more room you have, the bigger and easier it is to see your media. The downside to this, however, is that phones like the S24 Ultra can be somewhat unwieldy. Especially if you’re someone with smaller hands, managing a phone like that can be a pain — sometimes literally!
A phone like the OnePlus Open solves this problem a bit by giving you an even larger display that can fold in half. It’s even got a world-class camera system that blew us away.
If you’d rather have a smaller-sized phone, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Asus Zenfone 11 are phenomenal choices depending on what form factor you want. These are substantially easier to manage and can be used with one hand, but you have less room for your movies and games on the flip side. It also means you can fit less content on the screen at one time, and if you’re someone who likes to increase your font size, things are easier to read, which could result in you having to do a lot of scrolling.
And, of course, there are plenty of phones that fall somewhere in the middle between these two extremes. If you’re really concerned about whether or not a phone will be too big or small, your best bet is to honestly go hands-on with it yourself at your local carrier store or Best Buy before making your purchase.
Are software updates important?
It’s easy to compare displays, processors, and cameras, but something that’s just as important to talk about is software updates. Android is constantly evolving and getting better, and while it’s nice to get updates that keep your phone feeling fresh and new, security updates are far more important than feature updates.
Samsung and Google offer seven years of software updates for their phones — the most of any smartphone company today. OnePlus, OPPO, Xiaomi, and Vivo come in second place with four Android OS updates and one extra year of security updates for their flagship phones.
But the number of years supported doesn’t paint the whole picture. Companies like OnePlus and Motorola often deliver bi-monthly security updates — so you’ll get six security updates per year — while Samsung and Google often update every month. This isn’t normally a big deal but could make a difference if you regularly use public hotspots or hotel Wi-Fi.
Google also always updates its Pixel phones to the latest version of Android first, something that makes a lot of sense considering Google makes Android. The downside to this is that the Pixel can sometimes be a little too cutting-edge and has been known to introduce bugs into the experience from time to time.
Generally, the more you spend on a phone, the more often (and longer) it’ll receive software updates. Most $200-300 Android phones will only receive one or two major software updates, while $1,000 phones will see five to seven years of updates.
So, how important is it that your phone gets software updates? That ultimately depends on how much you care about new Android features and how long you plan to use your phone. Google releases a new version of Android every year, and while these updates don’t tend to be that drastic from year to year, they give your phone important features and security settings that help keep it running in tip-top shape for a long time.
If you keep your phone for years at a time — often five or more years — these updates will ensure that you can continue to use new apps. Over time, Google discontinues support for older versions of Android because it becomes too much of a problem for developers to test compatibility with older phones as well as newer ones.
How do I choose a smartphone camera?
Over the last couple of years, there’s been a trend with certain phone companies to throw as many cameras onto their devices as possible. As it’s become more common for phones to ship with two, three, or even four cameras, there’s something of an expectation that phones have to have multiple camera sensors to be any good.
Spoiler alert — this isn’t true.
Let’s look at the Galaxy S24 Ultra. It has a 200MP primary camera, yet the Google Pixel 8 Pro with its 50MP main sensor tends to take better photos. The biggest difference lies in the software — Google’s is best for capturing objects in motion like pets and kids — and the secondary lenses that add more abilities to a phone’s camera.
And while having those extra camera sensors can be a lot of fun, it’s only worthwhile if they’re high-quality. Far too often, we see companies throw in a lot of extra cameras on their phones only to have these secondary lenses not be very good. But, of course, the primary camera sensor is always the most important, so that’s the one you want to pay attention to the most.Â
There are so many other factors that come into play with phone cameras, so don’t let the megapixel count be your only factor for judging them when you’re out shopping. Read reviews, look at camera samples, and you’ll have a much better understanding of what kind of camera you’re dealing with.
What size should my phone’s battery be?
Battery life isn’t the most fun thing to talk about with smartphones, but ultimately, it’s one of the most essential components. Your phone can have the best display and processor around, but if it’s constantly dying throughout the day, what’s the point?
There are many different battery capacities for all of the phones on this list, and if you don’t regularly keep up with them, it can be challenging to know what a good size is and what isn’t. So, here’s a general rule of thumb. If you’re buying an Android phone, the ideal capacity is 4,000mAh or larger. As phones move toward larger displays with faster refresh rates, more battery is needed to keep them powered throughout the day.
Of course, this can vary a bit depending on the type of phone you’re buying. Phones with smaller screen sizes and lower display refresh rates can still get through a full day of use without a hitch because they generally draw less power than phones with more impressive specs. The best Android phones often have extremely fast charging speeds, and phones like the OnePlus 12 will get an entire day’s worth of battery life in just a 20 minute charge.
These are factors you’ll need to consider when shopping for your phone, but generally, more mAh means more battery life.
What other features should I look for in a smartphone?
Last but certainly not least, there are a few smaller features and specs that can be easy to overlook when doing your shopping — a prime example being NFC. NFC stands for Near Field Communication, and it’s the chip in most phones that allows you to pay with your smartphone with Google Pay at grocery stores, restaurants, etc. All of the phones on this list support NFC, but many cheaper phones often lack the feature. You may not care about Google Pay, but if you do, it’s worth double-checking that the phone you want to buy does have NFC.
Another spec to check for is an IP rating. This is a seal of protection many phones have, and it ensures they’re protected from a certain amount of dust and water. So if you get caught outside in the rain or take your phone to the beach, a higher IP rating ensures that the phone should survive just fine. IP68 is the highest dust and water resistance rating, while cheaper phones might have something like IP53 which means some water and dust but not full submersion.
Some phones lack this IP rating yet boast water resistance or have a coating that gives them some protection. Those devices are also probably fine to get splashed with water here and there, but you don’t have that same guaranteed protection. The best-case scenario is to avoid getting your phone wet whenever possible, but if you happen to be around the water a lot, it’s probably worth getting something with that IP68 protection.
We should also address a trend going through the smartphone space for a few years now — the death of the headphone jack. The vast majority of new phones coming out these days no longer have the port, but few holdouts continue to offer it. It’s certainly nice to have if you’re someone who primarily uses wired headphones or earbuds, but if you’ve moved on to the wireless bandwagon, it’s not something you need to be all that concerned with.
We know that’s a lot to take in, but once you understand the kind of phone you’re looking for and the budget you have to work with, we hope this guide makes you feel better equipped to make the right decision. There are so many good phones out there, and we wouldn’t recommend one on this list if we didn’t think you’d be happy with it. Happy shopping, and enjoy your new phone!
