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- Our team of experts have reviewed over 600 smartphones and tablets, putting each through the same rigorous testing process.
- Each phone we review is rated on its performance, display quality, camera offerings, battery life and software experience.
- The Google Pixel 9a is the best mid-range phone to buy right now. It demonstrated excellent stamina in our battery testing, has very strong cameras and offers a class-leading seven years of software support.
- Read on to see which other mid-range phones we recommend, including the best iPhone in this price range, the strongest cameras and the longest battery life.
The Pixel 9a is now cheaper than ever
Our favourite mid-range phone is the Google Pixel 9a, thanks to its excellent cameras, extensive battery life and unrivalled software support. Right now, you can pick one up for its lowest price yet. Previously averaging £443 over the past 180 days, it's now available for just £347.
£347 was £443 on avg
Lowest price yet on the Samsung Galaxy A56
The Samsung Galaxy A56 is also down to its best price on record. Having averaged £456 in price over the last 180 days, it's now going for just £349 – the cheapest it's ever been.
£349 was £456 on avg
With flagship prices regularly stretching beyond £1,000, mid-range phones are more appealing than ever for those who don’t want to sink four figures on their next phone. The best mid-range smartphone right now is the Google Pixel 9a: the camera quality is phenomenal, battery life proved ridiculously extensive in our testing and you get a massive seven years of software support.
To reach this verdict, we’ve tested and reviewed all of the best smartphones, from high-level flagships to bargain budget phones. We’re constantly getting new iPhones and Android phones in for testing and reviewing, so this list is regularly updated with the newest and most impressive mid-rangers.
If you’re unsure what exactly you’re looking for, our buying guide below has a brief rundown of the features to keep an eye out for. Otherwise, read on to see our picks of the best mid-range phones to buy right now.
Best mid-range phone: At a glance
- Google Pixel 9a: Best mid-range phone overall | Check price
- iPhone 16e: Best mid-range iPhone | Check price
- OnePlus Nord 5: Best mid-range phone for battery life | Check price
- Xiaomi 15T Pro: Best mid-range phone cameras | Check price
How we test mid-range phones
When we receive a handset for review, we put it through a variety of tests. The first is performance, where we use two apps on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store: Geekbench 5 and GFXBench. These benchmarking apps provide CPU and GPU processing scores, and allow us to see where the phone fits in against the competition. A phone’s display is tested using our colorimeter and DisplayCAL software, which measures how colour-accurate a screen is, as well as providing maximum brightness and contrast ratio.
Our in-house battery life testing is performed using a looped video via the VLC app, with the screen set to 170cd/m2 brightness and flight mode engaged. We simply record where the video stops when the phone’s battery runs dry. Cameras are tested in a wide variety of lighting conditions, including landscape shots and indoor still life photography, and these images are compared against similarly priced rivals.
With a history that stretches back over two decades and a catalogue of tested and reviewed mobile devices that exceeds 600 in number, our experts are dab hands at sorting the bargains from the duds and deliver in-depth reviews based on hard facts and data.
We decide these rankings based on the merits of the phones and the results of our extensive, independent testing. Regardless of popularity or manufacturer, a phone will not earn a recommendation from us without delivering the quality to back it up.
Best mid-range phones you can buy in 2025
1. Google Pixel 9a: Best mid-range phone overall
Price when reviewed: From £349 | Check price at John Lewis
- Outstanding battery life
- Gorgeous cameras
- Generic design
- Pixel 8a is better value
Google’s Pixel 9a pairs a huge 5,100mAh battery with the excellent power efficiency of the Tensor G4 chipset to not only deliver the best stamina of any Pixel smartphone to date, but also one of the best phone battery life results we’ve ever seen.
On top of lasting an incredible 34hrs 5mins in our standard battery test, the Pixel 9a once again offers a class-leading seven years of software support, keeping it up to date until 2032, has a much brighter display than the previous generation and its cameras are amazing. The latter also now supports the Add Me feature, letting you composite the photographer into group shots.
We don’t love the new design – long live the camera bar – and battery life aside, the Pixel 8a still offers roughly the same experience, so if you want to save money, it’s still worth considering last year’s model. If you want the best possible phone under £500, however, there’s no dispute that the Google Pixel 9a is the one to choose.
Read our 2025 Google Pixel 9a review
Key specs – Processor: 3.1GHz Google Tensor G4; RAM: 8GB; Display: 6.3in, 2,424 x 1,080; Storage: 128GB, 256GB; Cameras: 48MP, 13MP (wide); Operating system: Android 15; Weight: 186g
2. iPhone 16e: Best mid-range iPhone
Price when reviewed: £549 | Check price at John Lewis
- Excellent video camera
- Faster performance
- 60Hz display
- Only one rear camera
The accolade of best affordable iPhone is something of a misnomer – there isn’t exactly much competition – but the iPhone 16e is undoubtedly a massive improvement over the previous option (2022’s iPhone SE 3).
The design is much more modern and brings improved performance with it and, crucially, much better battery life than its ageing predecessor. You only get one camera on the rear but it is, at least, a great one, with 4K Dolby Vision video recording being a particular highlight.
It’s not all perfect. The display still refreshes at a retro 60Hz and a second rear camera wouldn’t have gone amiss, but anyone looking for the iPhone experience without having to pay those Apple premiums will find the iPhone 16e to be the ideal middle ground.
Read our 2025 iPhone 16e review
Key specs – Processor: 4.04GHz Apple A18; RAM: 8GB; Display: 6.1in, 2,532 x 1,170; Storage: 128GB, 256GB, 512GB; Cameras: 48MP; Operating system: iOS 18; Weight: 167g
3. OnePlus Nord 5: Best mid-range phone for battery life
Price when reviewed: £349 | Check price at Amazon
- Great for… class-leading battery life and outstanding performance
- Not so great for… mediocre ultrawide camera and limited software support
The OnePlus Nord 5 absolutely smashed our in-house looping video battery test, lasting for an incredible 35hrs 25mins on a single charge. That’s the best battery life we’ve ever recorded in this price range and one of the longest lasting phones you can buy at any price.
The rest of our testing proved equally impressive, with the Nord 5 delivering excellent speeds in the CPU test and achieving a brilliant 83fps in the onscreen GPU benchmarks. The 6.83in AMOLED display gets a wonderfully smooth 144Hz refresh rate and we recorded excellent colour accuracy in testing, with an average Delta E of just 1.1.
OS updates for four years is fine enough but some rivals get six or seven, and the ultrawide camera produced fairly mediocre shots in our testing, with middling levels of detail and inconsistent contrast balancing. For power and performance, however, the OnePlus Nord 5 is a wonderfully speedy stamina champion.
Read our 2025 OnePlus Nord 5 review
Key specs – Processor: 3GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 3; RAM: 8GB, 12GB; Display: 6.83in, 2,800 x 1,272; Storage: 256GB, 512GB; Cameras: 50MP, 8MP (wide); Operating system: Android 15; Weight: 211g
4. Xiaomi 15T Pro: Best mid-range phone cameras
Price when reviewed: £649 | Check price at Amazon
- Great for… stunning 5x telephoto camera and flawless display
- Not so great for… fiddly software and not the best software support
Telephoto cameras are rare enough in this price range but it’s rarer still for them to be as impressive as the Xiaomi 15T Pro’s 5x periscope lens. This 50-megapixel shooter captured bold, striking images in our testing, with the exceptional detail and punchy colours making it particularly well-suited to portrait photography.
The 50-megapixel main camera and 12-megapixel ultrawide impressed too, with gorgeous colour tones and strong detail levels on both. Our display testing revealed that the 6.83in AMOLED screen is one of the best around, too: it hit a ridiculously bright 2,536cd/m2 when playing HDR content and we recorded an average Delta E of 1.07, indicating excellent colour accuracy.
Xiaomi’s HyperOS software is a little on the cluttered side, and the four years of OS updates can’t match the best in this price range, but otherwise, there’s very little to dislike here. For the best mid-range photos around, the Xiaomi 15T Pro is the way to go.
Read our 2025 Xiaomi 15T Pro review
Key specs – Processor: 3.63GHz MediaTek Dimensity 9400+; RAM: 12GB; Display: 6.83in, 2,772 x 1,272; Storage: 256GB, 512GB, 1TB; Cameras: 50MP, 50MP (telephoto), 12MP (wide); Operating system: Android 15; Weight: 210g
5. Honor 400 Pro: Best mid-range phone for gaming
Price when reviewed: £499 | Check price at John Lewis
- Great for… excellent gaming performance and six years of software support
- Not so great for… limited colour options and weak ultrawide camera
The Honor 400 Pro delivered outstanding results in our GFXBench gaming tests, with particularly strong off-screen results of 147fps. Running intensive 3D games like Genshin Impact, the Honor 400 Pro showed its mettle; even with the graphical settings dialed up to maximum, it stuck fast to a solid 60fps onscreen framerate, and it didn’t overheat, either.
General performance was equally impressive, delivering competitive Geekbench 6 results for this price range, and it ran our looping video battery test for over 28 hours. The 6.7in AMOLED display is gorgeous, too: our colour accuracy testing produced an average Delta E of just 1.05, indicating excellent colour accuracy, and the brightness soared to 1,444cd/m2 when displaying HDR content.
It would have been nice to have more choice of colours – there are only black and grey models – and the ultrawide camera disappointed in our testing, producing images with washed-out contrast. Regardless, for the best mid-range gaming performance, the Honor 400 Pro is king of the hill.
Read our 2025 Honor 400 Pro review
Key specs – Processor: 3GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3; RAM: 12GB; Display: 6.7in, 2,800 x 1,280; Storage: 256GB, 512GB; Cameras: 200MP, 50MP (telephoto), 12MP (wide); Operating system: Android 15; Weight: 205g
6. Samsung Galaxy A56: Best mid-range Samsung phone
Price when reviewed: £499 | Check price at John Lewis
- Great battery life
- Six years of software support
- Rivals are faster
- No camera improvements
If you prefer the Samsung ecosystem, there’s an excellent mid-range option for you, too, in the Samsung Galaxy A56. The design is particularly noteworthy here, with the slim 7.4mm body of the phone feeling great in the hand and the combination of a sturdy aluminium frame, IP67 dust and water resistance rating and Gorilla Glass Victus Plus on the front and rear making it feel very robust.
Battery life doesn’t quite reach the heights of the best mid-range Android phones but it’s still among the best you can get in this price range; it lasted 28hrs 5mins in our in-house test. And keeping the theme of longevity going, it also gets for six years of OS updates and security patches, meaning that it will stay up to date until 2031.
The cameras are solid, albeit no different from the previous generation, and performance is reasonable. If you prefer a Samsung and don’t want to fork out on a Galaxy S25 Ultra, this big-screened beauty is your best bet.
Read our 2025 Samsung Galaxy A56 review
Key specs – Processor: 2.9GHz Exynos 1580; RAM: 8GB; Display: 6.7in, 2,340 x 1,080; Storage: 256GB; Cameras: 50MP, 12MP (wide), 5MP (macro); Operating system: Android 15; Weight: 198g
How to choose the best mid-range phone for you
How much should I be spending?
With phone prices constantly on the rise, the middle of the market is something of a moving target. For the purposes of this list, however, we’re looking at phones that fall between £300 and £700. Anything less is getting into budget phone territory, while above is where we’ll find the all-singing, all-dancing flagships. Here, you’re getting the best of both worlds, with plenty of great features for a price that won’t break the bank.
What features should I look out for?
Everyone will have different priorities, but the beauty of this price range is that you’re getting a better bang for your buck, in terms of functionality. Mileage may vary from handset to handset, but in general, these are the key features to bear in mind while perusing the products:
Display
The size, resolution and refresh rate of a display will give you a good idea of how it will feel to use, while our expert testing and full-length reviews can let you know how bright the display can get and how accurate the colour reproduction is. LCD screens are still very common at this price, but there are a fair few OLEDs in here too, which in general have more impactful colours and a deeper black level.
Cameras
The phone camera is one area in which you really do need to spend the big bucks if you want the best on the market, so don’t expect to see any far-reaching telephoto cameras here. You will, however, get a decent array of main lenses, backups like ultrawide sensors, close-up macro cameras and selfie shooters. We lay out the resolutions offered by each phone’s cameras, but to see them in action, head to the full reviews, where we’ve got camera samples for you to check out.
Battery life
We use the same test to judge every phone’s battery life, allowing us to accurately compare their performance. You can see in the full reviews how individual handsets perform if battery life is top of your priority list. Also, keep an eye out for charging speeds – even at this price, we see some truly ridiculous speeds that can fill a phone from empty in less than an hour.
Performance
As with most features, the top-end chipsets generally don’t make it down to mid-range phones, but that doesn’t mean that you lose out on performance. For most people, the speeds offered by mid-range phones are more than enough for daily tasks, and the GPUs can often put in a decent showing with relatively graphics-intensive games, too.
Storage
The phones in this list generally offer one or two of the following storage capacities: 128GB, 256GB and 512GB. For most people, there should be plenty of space for all your apps and photos, but if you find yourself nudging up against that space limit often, look out for models that have a microSD card slot – this will let you expand the storage on the cheap.
