Nokia G21 is a good affordable option for those who are mostly concerned with battery life and a clean Android experience. However, it does come with its share of cons as well, which are tough to ignore. The phone was first announced on the 14th of February 2022 and released the following day. The device comes at a starting price of €189, which approximately converts to $206. It comes in Nordic Blue and Dusk colors and has three variants. The base variant has 3 GB of RAM and 64 GB of internal storage. The two other variants have 4 GB of RAM with 64 GB and 128 GB of internal memory.
At this price, the base variant should have at least 4 GB of RAM. The phone has a dedicated card slot that can accommodate an SD card and two Nano-SIM cards. Nokia G21 can also handle 2G, 3G, and 4G connections. The phone has a glass front with a plastic back and frame. Its build quality is surprisingly good. Coming to the dimensions, the phone measures 6.48 by 2.99 by 0.33 inches. It should be mentioned here that the device isn’t easy to use with a single hand, though. The phone weighs 190 grams, for which Nokia deserves credit. The device delivers a below-average multimedia experience, which is one of the major issues with it.
The Nokia G21 has a 6.5-inch HD+ IPS LCD screen whose aspect ratio is 20:9. Its screen-to-body ratio and PPI density are 81.6% and 270 respectively. The phone can only go up to 400 nits of brightness, which might not be enough on a very sunny day. On the bright side, the phone has a screen refresh rate of 90 Hz, which isn’t very common on budget models. In the sound department, Nokia G21 has a loudspeaker and a 3.5 mm headphone jack. The second major issue with this device is its poor overall performance. You will have to deal with stutters, and it’s safe to say that the phone is only meant for basic use.
Unisoc T606 CPU handles the phone’s overall performance. The phone’s gaming performance is handled by the Mali-G57 MP1 GPU. It runs Android 11 out of the box, but it will get major OS updates for two years. Similarly, it will also get security updates for three years. This is a major upside of owning the Nokia G21. For communication, the phone has dual-band Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Direct, Hotspot, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS, USB Type-C 2.0, and USB On-The-Go. The phone not only has FM radio but NFC as well, which is often absent in budget phones. Its battery backup is nothing short of amazing. The phone has a 5050 mAh lithium polymer non-removable battery that supports 18W fast charging.
If you are an average user, it should easily get you around two days. The phone also supports USB Power Delivery 3.0. Coming to cameras, its overall performance is acceptable. It has a 50 MP wide-angle, 2 MP macro, and 2 MP depth sensor camera on the rear. The phone’s camera features include LED flash, HDR, and panorama. For selfies and video communications, the Nokia G21 has an 8 MP wide-angle camera. As for video recording, both the front camera and the rear camera setup can do so in 1080p@30fps. When it comes to sensors, the phone has an accelerometer, proximity, and a side-mounted fingerprint sensor.
