New smartphone garners attention for all the right reasons

But, there’s another smartphone that has been grabbing all the attention in India and for a good reason. The Galaxy Note 10 Lite marks a new chapter for Samsung — it’s the first time the brand is bringing the versatile S-Pen (its trademark stylus) to a flagship killer smartphone priced under Rs 40,000.

The Note 10 Lite comes in three colour variants (all with the Aura prefix). Our review unit was the Aura Glow version that takes design cues from the Aura Glow version on the Note 10+, but it doesn’t possess the same ‘glow’. Part of the reason is that the Note 10 Lite features a faux glass finish that almost passes off for real glass. The lack of a glass back also means that there’s no wireless charging. The device feels quite good in your hand despite its large 6.7-inch Super AMOLED display (1080 x 2400 pixels) and 199 gm heft. This is a vibrant display with great colours and a very tiny cut-out (for the selfie cam). It’s great to see a 3.5mm headphone jack that Samsung omitted in the Note 10+.

At the heart of the Note 10 Lite is an Exynos 9810 processor; you can choose from two hardware variants — 6GB128GB and 8GB/128GB (that we tested). There’s also room for a Micro SD card (up to 1TB) courtesy a dual SIM hybrid slot. One of our favourite features of this device is its rear cam that blends three 12MP lenses including an ultra-wide lens. The 32MP selfie cam produces good lowlight images while the 4500 mAh battery won’t let you down. But, ultimately this device is about its S-Pen that can perform almost all the same tricks as the S-Pen in the top-of-the-line Note 10, including doodling and air gestures that allow you to control the cam.(Rs 38,999 onwards)