Galaxy A53 and Galaxy A33 have no headphone jack, no charger in the box
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"Never change a winning team," the saying goes, but sometimes, just sometimes, change is inevitable. Samsung has seemingly forgotten said mantra as it has changed two key aspects of the mid-range Galaxy A-series that could potentially upset some people.
Samsung dropped the headphone jacks from both the Galaxy A53 5G and Galaxy A33 5G. But that's not all, neither phone will have a charging brick inside the box either.
A little backstory first: Apple was the first to drop both the headphone jack and the in-box phone charger with the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 12, respectively. The removal of the 3.5mm audio jack was justified with "courage" as it propelled Apple's vision for a wireless, AirPods-domineered future, whereas the reason dropping of the in-box charger was apparently done for environmental reasons (but it has also reportedly saved the company a whopping $6.5 billion).
At both occasions, Samsung did not miss the opportunity to take a low jab at its biggest rival by mocking Apple for not including a charging brick inside the box or having no headphone jack. It would all have been a bed of roses if Samsung didn't embrace both cost-cutting techniques later on and promptly try to scrub away the incriminating ads from the Internet, but it did. Apple's moves opened Pandora's box and suddenly, its biggest competitors realized that why, yes, you could actually get away with providing less accessories along with the phone you're selling.
Starting with the Galaxy S20-series, Samsung's flagships no longer featured a headphone jack, while the Galaxy S21-series saw the removal of the in-box charging brick and wired earbuds. The very same e-waste problem raised by Apple and the "unnecessary duplication" of accessories were cited as the main reasons for the downsizing of the features.
Galaxy A53 and Galaxy A33 have no headphone jacks
We had a good run headphone jack, but the time has come for you to start disappearing on mid-range phones as well, at least in Samsung's camp. Both the Galaxy A52 and A32 came with headphone jacks, as well as their respective chargers in the box. However, removing both hardware "niceties" at the same time might not be received that well from the potential adopters of either phone and fans of Samsung's excellent mid-range phones alike. Premium flagships aside, the lower you go down the line, the harder the resistance to removing such vital features would be. At least the microSD card slot has been kept on both the Galaxy A53 and the A33.
These changes will most certainly trickle down to the rest of the upcoming mid-rangers from the Galaxy A and Galaxy M-series in the very near future, as the dangerous precedent has been set by the latest Galaxy A33 and A53. It remains to be seen if any future mid-range Samsung phones will come with headphone jacks or chargers in the box. It's also unclear what the future holds for Samsung's entry-level devices, which will probably drop the headphone jack and the charging brick last.
In our hands-on preview of the Galaxy A53, we called it "seemingly an incremental improvement over the A52 5G. Despite that, it does manage to bring something new to the table like a significantly better processor, better stereo speakers, and a slightly larger battery". You can read our full hands-on Galaxy A53 preview right here, but the reality of the situation is that if you're using a Galaxy A52 5G or even an A52s 5G, the latest Galaxy A53 could be a hard bargain.
What do you think about the Galaxy A53 and Galaxy A33 coming with no headphone jack or charging bricks? Would that affect your buying decision and sway you elsewhere or not? Make sure to drop a line and let us know!
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