What Budget SIM Free Smartphone??

stevewilliams_2

Hi,

I'm looking for a budget smartphone for my sister - she would like to make calls, text, take photos and access Facebook from it.

Her budget is up to £115.

I'm presuming it would need to be SIM free as she is currently living in Dubai, but is home for approx. 3 months of the year. I have a Nexus 4 and I simply bought a PAYG SIM whilst out there visiting earlier this year and she would like to do the same.

Any suggestions welcome.

Thanks in advance

grumbler

Search the board for 'huawei' that seem to offer the best value for money smartphones ATM, including in this price range.

Cisco001

huawei Y300
Nokia 520

noelphobic

I had a Galaxy Ace and would not recommend it. It has a tiny memory and doesn't allow many apps to be stored on the SD card. The memory gets full and it won't allow you to send or receive texts. I had it less than a year but gave it away because of this problem.

I now have a ZTE Blade 3 but wouldn't recommend that either because it freezes a lot. I'm not having much luck with phones!

Orrin

Cisco001 wrote: »

huawei Y300
Nokia 520

This.

Also the Nokia Lumia 620 may be an option at that price - Virgin were doing refurbs for £110. The 620 has a flash and comes with global navigation coverage.

daveyj792

Personally I would go for one of the Nokia Lumia phones. Nokia Lumia 520 has been suggested and falls within your sister's budget.

d123

Another vote for either the Lumia 520 or 620, it's a well made phone with adequate storage for apps etc (unlike some of the budget androids).

Make sure you buy from CarphoneWarehouse or Phones4u to get an unlocked one and your sister can use it with any sim she wants.

womble12345

Get a 2nd hand phone from ebay but make sure its a quality one. An HTC Desire will be within your budget.
Personally I have had 3 smartphones, a new ZTE Blade which was a bit laggy and after that I figured I would buy a second phone, I try and go for a top of the line model from 2 years ago. I used to have an HTC Desire and recent upgraded to a Samsung Galaxy S2, both were top of the line when launched.

d123

womble12345 wrote: »

Get a 2nd hand phone from ebay but make sure its a quality one. An HTC Desire will be within your budget.
Personally I have had 3 smartphones, a new ZTE Blade which was a bit laggy and after that I figured I would buy a second phone, I try and go for a top of the line model from 2 years ago. I used to have an HTC Desire and recent upgraded to a Samsung Galaxy S2, both were top of the line when launched.

An HTC Desire is now well out of date, and even worse than the newer budget android phones, you get about 150MB of space to put apps, which is gone in a flash (compared to the Nokia 520 which gives around 6GB, as an example).