Nokia 5250 Review

Introduction:

The Nokia 5250 is the most budget-friendly smartphone released with the 5xxx branding so far. Without any doubt, this handset is targeting first time smartphone users with its attractive price ($146/€115 without contract), so it doesn't come as a shocking surprise that some compromises were made - for example, it sports a 2.8-inch resistive screen and only 51MB built-in memory, while the lack of some vital features like 3G connection and Wi-Fi can make anyone wonder what's better - to purchase the affordable Nokia 5250 or sacrifice a few more bucks and buy an all-around better low-end smartphone. In all honesty, it's a matter of personal choice, but please read on for our opinion on the matter.

Design:

As can be expected from a handset in this price range, the Nokia 5250's body is made of plastic, but somehow surprisingly it looks reasonably well and feels good in the hand for what it is. Its dimensions (4.09 x 1.93 x 0.55 inches) mean that you can put the Nokia 5250 in your pocket and forget it's there, while the phone feels comfortable to hold in both portrait and landscape mode.



You can compare the Nokia 5250 with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.

As we mentioned above, the Nokia 5250 has a 2.8-inch resistive screen, which isn't that great, but its 360x640 resolution and 16 million colors mean that you'll get vivid color reproduction and face no problems to distinguish text. However, the Nokia 5250's viewing angles are a bit rubbish and the  screen is practically unusable in direct sunlight.


On the front side, this phone has three physical buttons - call, menu and end, while on the right side of the handset you'll find (from top to bottom) the volume rocker, the lock/unlock slider and the dedicated camera button. You can find the 3.5mm headphone jack, the charging port and the microUSB located on the top side of the phone, while on the back side a 2MP camera resides.

Interface and Features:

The Nokia 5250 runs the tried and tested Symbian OS S60 5th Edition. Since pretty much everything has been said about this OS, we wouldn't go into details, especially as there are no big surprises - you get the usual Symbian experience. This means that you can choose in what mode - grid or list - to see the icons on your menu and it takes not one, but two presses to access anything - one to mark it and one to actually access it. Due to the resistive technology that the Nokia 5250's screen utilizes, scrolling may be a bit of an issue then and now, but it's not a massive setback. One pro is that the menu can be customized according to the user's personal preferences, while a long press of the menu button activates the task manager. Another good point of the Nokia 5250 is that its phonebook capacity depends solely on the free memory on your phone (or microSD card), i.e. there is no limitation for the number of contacts.


Messaging is also optimized, since this affordable smartphone comes with a stylus out of the box and handwriting is supported (similar to some other Nokia 5xxx phones, for example the Nokia 5230). A full virtual QWERTY is also there (but only in landscape mode) and the buttons are well-sized for a 2.8-inch screen, although people with bigger fingers may face some problems when using it. Furthermore, the responsiveness of the Nokia 5250's screen could have been a bit better, but it's not a big issue at all.



Internet and Connectivity:

One of the areas where the Nokia 5250 definitely disappoints is connectivity options. In fact, it supports only EDGE and even Wi-Fi is not present. Furthermore, a GPS service is also not available and to make things even worse, you don't get a USB cable out of the box.

The browser is what we have come to expect from Nokia, which means downright dated, but for optimal browsing experience on this phone, you can consider downloading Opera Mobile or Opera Mini. Sadly, the overall internet experience seriously suffers from the lack of Wi-Fi and 3G support.

Camera and Multimedia:

The Nokia 5250 has a 2MP camera not unlike its immediate predecessor the Nokia Nuron 5230. There is nothing new about the camera interface, but sadly, the phone's camera performance is not particularly good. To start with, it doesn't support autofocus and lacks a flash, not to mention that the quality of the images taken by the Nokia 5250 leaves a lot to be desired - even if you take a picture in perfect conditions, the colors are washed out, hazy and far from natural.



The video recording capabilities of the Nokia 5250 are not much better either, but in good conditions the videos made by this device can be described as "passable".

Nokia 5250 Sample Video:



For a handset that's advertised as a "music-centered phone", it's a little bit disappointing that it comes with a built-in memory of only 51MB - even though the Nokia 5250 does have a slot for up to 16GB microSD card. And even if it's understandable that this phone doesn't have pre-installed microSD card (due to its price), it's still annoying that when you put one, the phone's performance become sluggish from time to time. The music player is the same old Nokia music player that we know perfectly well, but the speaker is really loud (read: one or two bits louder than your average smartphone) and even if it's true that the Nokia 5250's headphones won't win any awards for clear sound, listening to music on a busy street is quite a comfortable experience with this phone. To reiterate the fact that it's a music-oriented handset, the Nokia 5250 also offers pre-installed RDS support for scanning of FM radio stations, as well as a free version of Guitar Hero.


It's hard to expect that a handset costing $146 contract-free with a 2.8-inch screen will be a multimedia powerhouse, but still it's a pity that of all video formats that we have tested (DivX, H.264, MOV, Xvid and MPEG4), the Nokia 5250 was able to play only MPEG4 in its native resolution (360x640) and in the 480x640 resolution.

Performance:

During our call tests, our voices sounded loud and clear on both sides, although the person on the other side of the line said our voice sounded a little bit unnatural. According to its manufacturer, the phone is rated at 7 hours of talk time, while its stand by time is listed as 18 days.

Conclusion:

The Nokia 5250 is a pretty basic smartphone, but that's not to say that it doesn't have its strong points - even if we put aside its affordability, which is the phone's main advantage, it offers good design and excellent music capabilities. However, if you are not overly impressed by this handset, you may look at some other low-end Nokia phones -  for example, the Nokia Nuron 5230 or simply check our "Best Budget phones" category.

Nokia 5250 Video Review: