Galaxy A8 specs comparison vs A5 and S8

by Daniel Petrov / Dec 19, 2017, 4:19 AM

The A8+ is taller but narrower than the A7 (2017), resembling the S8+ design

Samsung just lifted the veil over its midrange warriors for next year, the Galaxy A8 and A8+, and the fact that on the exterior they resemble much more the Galaxy S8 and S8+ than their A5 and A7 predecessors made us include the flagship in this specs comparison as well

For starters, the phones sport Samsung's Infinity Design, as they are taller and narrower than their predecessors, yet sport larger display diagonals. The screens are with an 18.5:9 aspect ratio, though, so that's something to consider - even though the 5.6" display sounds larger than the 5.2" one on the A5 (2017), in terms of area they are pretty similar. What the Inifnity display design does is improve the screen-to-body ratio with trimmed top and bottom bezels, but even then it gives way to the execution on the Galaxy S8, which shaves off its bezels much more than the A8, for instance.

Surprisingly enough, the new midrangers ship with as much RAM as this year's flagships, so Samsung better step up its random access memory game for the S9 and S9+. When it comes to horsepower, though, the unnamed octa-core Exynos that is in the A8 and A8+ seems to be a newer model compared to the 7880 in the A5 and A7, with two fast 2.2GHz cores and six frugal 1.6 GHz ones. Last year the A5 and A7 had the most impressing battery lives not only among their peers, but among all popular phones, and he fact that Samsung stuffed a 3000mAh and outfitting the A8 and A8+ with the same capacities, but an eventually more frugal processor, should at least repeat the achievement, so we can't wait to run those two through our battery test.

Last but not least, the camera situation is improved compared to the A5 and A7, as the A8 duo sports the same 16MP camera resolution, but with wider f/1.7 aperture which should help in low-light that was the Achilles heel of their predecessors. Moreover, the A8 and A8+ come with dual selfie cameras, where they beat both last year's midrangers, and this year's flagships from Samsung, at least in theory, we'll see how they perform in practice.

Samsung Galaxy A8 (2018) vs Samsung Galaxy A5 (2017) vs Samsung Galaxy S8

Display

Size

5.6 inches

5.2 inches

5.8 inches

Resolution

1080 x 2220 pixels

1080 x 1920 pixels

1440 x 2960 pixels

Aspect Ratio

18.5:9

Pixel density

441 PPI

424 PPI

570 PPI

Technology

Super AMOLED

Screen-to-body

75.60 %

71.51 %

84.26 %

Hardware & Performance

System chip

Samsung Exynos 5 Octa 7885

Samsung Exynos 7 Octa 7880

Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 MSM8998

Processor

Octa-core, 2200 MHz, ARM Cortex-A73 and ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit, 14 nm

Octa-core, 1900 MHz, ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit, 14 nm

Octa-core, 2350 MHz, Kryo 280, 64-bit, 10 nm

GPU

Mali-G71

Mali-T830 MP3

Adreno 540

RAM

4GB LPDDR4

3GB LPDDR3

4GB LPDDR4

Internal storage

64GB

32GB

64GB

OS

Android (9.0 Pie, 8.0 Oreo, 7.1 Nougat), Samsung One UI

Android (8.0 Oreo, 7.0 Nougat, 6.0 Marshmallow)

Android (9.0 Pie, 8.0 Oreo, 7.0 Nougat), Samsung One UI

Battery

Capacity

3000 mAh

Charging

Fast charging

Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0

Talk time

30.00 hours

Stand-by time

13.4 days (321 hours)

Talk time (3G)

19.00 hours

16.00 hours

Internet use

3G: 12 hours; LTE: 14 hours; Wi-Fi: 15 hours

3G: 13 hours; LTE: 16 hours; Wi-Fi: 18 hours

3G: 12 hours; LTE: 14 hours; Wi-Fi: 14 hours

Music playback

43.00 hours

53.00 hours

88.00 hours

Video playback

17.00 hours

19.00 hours

17.00 hours

Camera

Rear

Single camera

Main camera

16 megapixels

12 megapixels

Features

Phase-detection autofocus

Autofocus, CMOS image sensor

Optical image stabilization, Phase-detection autofocus

Specifications

Aperture size: F1.7

Aperture size: F1.9; Focal length: 27 mm

Aperture size: F1.7; Focal length: 26 mm; Sensor size: 1/2.55"; Pixel size: 1.4 μm

Video recording

1920x1080 (Full HD) (30 fps)

3840x2160 (4K UHD) (30 fps), 2560x1440 (QHD), 1920x1080 (Full HD) (60 fps), 1280x720 (HD) (240 fps)

Features

Hyperlapse, Digital image stabilization, Video calling, Video sharing

Video calling, Video sharing

High Dynamic Range mode (HDR), Time-lapse video, Hyperlapse, Continuous autofocus, Object tracking, Picture-taking during video recording, Video light, Digital image stabilization, Video calling, Video sharing

Front

16 megapixels

8 megapixels

Video capture

1920x1080 (Full HD) (30 fps)

2560x1440 (QHD)

Design

Dimensions

5.87 x 2.78 x 0.33 inches (149.2 x 70.6 x 8.4 mm)

5.75 x 2.81 x 0.31 inches (146.1 x 71.4 x 7.9 mm)

5.86 x 2.68 x 0.31 inches (148.9 x 68.1 x 8.0 mm)

Weight

6.07 oz (172 g)

5.61 oz (159 g)

5.47 oz (155 g)

Materials

Back: Glass (Corning Gorilla Glass 5); Frame: Aluminum

Back: Glass; Frame: Metal

Back: Glass (Corning Gorilla Glass 5); Frame: Aluminum

Resistance

Water, Dust; IP 68

Biometrics

Fingerprint (touch)

Iris scanner, 2D Face unlock, Fingerprint (touch)

Features

Notification light

Touch sensitive control keys

Options

2 Comments

1. master-mkk

Posts: 214; Member since: Aug 27, 2014

I will wait couple of months before buying the new A8+ because as always the prices will fall drastically over the first the first 2 months and then satel down