Samsung Galaxy S25 FE Review: Great value or some compromises?

So, every year, Samsung launches its flagship S series phones, and a few months later, we also get a ‘Fan Edition’ phone that is almost as good as Samsung's flagships, with a few corners cut, albeit at a cheaper price. But this year, with the launch of Galaxy S25 FE, the price difference has become negligible to a greater extent. This new guy launched at 1 lakh rupees for the 8/256GB version, putting it close to the S25, which retails at 104,999 for 12/128GB trim. So, is this new phone the best for the price, or are there some shortcomings? Let's find everything out in our Samsung Galaxy S25 FE review. Before diving in, let's have a quick glance at the specifications, shall we?

Samsung Galaxy S25 FE Specifications

• Design, build: 161.3 x 76.6 x 7.4 mm, 190 g, IP68 rating (dust/water resistant up to 1.5m for 30 min), glass front/back (Gorilla Glass Victus+), aluminum frame

  

• Display: 6.7-inch Dynamic LTPO AMOLED 2X, FHD+ (1080 x 2340 px), 120Hz refresh rate, HDR10+, 1900 nits peak brightness

• Chipset: Exynos 2400 (4 nm), 10-core CPU, Xclipse 940 GPU

• Memory: 8GB RAM, 128GB / 256GB / 512GB storage (UFS 4.0, non-expandable)

• Software & UI: Android 16, One UI 8 (7 years of major upgrades)

• Rear Camera: Triple (50MP wide, 8MP telephoto with 3x optical zoom, 12MP ultrawide)

• Front Camera: 12MP wide, 4K@60fps, HDR10+

• Security: Under-display optical fingerprint sensor

• Connectivity: Dual-SIM / eSIM, Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.4, GPS / GLONASS / GALILEO / BDS, NFC, USB-C 3.2, 5G

• Sensors: Accelerometer, Gyro, Proximity, Compass, Barometer

• Battery: 4900 mAh with 45W wired (65% in 30 min), 15W wireless (Qi2), and reverse wireless charging

Buy & Read full specs of Samsung Galaxy S25 FE here

Samsung Galaxy S25 FE Review

Design

First of all, it has a great design that almost gives déjà vu of a more expensive S25+. While I tested the phone, I almost had to remind myself time and time again that I wasn’t accidentally carrying the S25+ with me since those two are very similar, physically. The rounded corners, the flat frames, the “traffic light” camera design… I mean, everything about the S25 FE screams “I’m something you’ve seen before”.

Samsung has made a few small changes, though:

• The first one is that it’s slimmer, but I’m willing to bet no one’s gonna notice it since the difference I’m talking about here is literally less than half a millimeter.

• The S25 FE is also 10% lighter now…which is actually noticeable in everyday use—and it’s a pretty impressive achievement since Samsung managed to up the battery size this year too. More on that in just a minute.

• And finally, the S25 FE ditches regular aluminum for armor aluminum frames that are supposed to be 10% stronger as well.

I kinda wish Samsung hadn’t reserved Victus 2 glass for its premium phones only, but it’s not like the Victus+ glass on the S25 FE is totally fragile or anything, so that’s okay, I guess! This guy is also IP68 dust and water-sealed, and it’s available in a bunch of yummy colorways. Including the one called “Navy Blue”, which is a personal favorite of mine. So yeah, all things considered, I’m pretty happy with its design.

Display

Although it sucks that Samsung couldn’t think of a single upgrade in terms of the display. I can think of at least three off the top of my head, like this uneven chin bezel, the lack of an LTPO panel to save battery, and the same-old optical fingerprint reader. That optical sensor means I need to press my thumb for like, half a second longer than the regular Galaxy S25—and it honestly annoyed me more than it probably should. I would surely expect a snappier unlocking when I'm paying 1 lakh for a phone! The usual complaints aside, I’d say this is still a solid A- display, in terms of quality. Like, do I even need to say anything other than “this is a Samsung-made AMOLED screen”? And by the way, its stereo speakers also pack a punch to complement the multimedia experience so well, whereas the S25 FE has good haptics too. But I wish the haptics were a bit stronger. Maybe its peak brightness could’ve been a little higher? I mean, around 1,300 nits of full-screen brightness or 1,900 nits for HDR content definitely isn’t bad by any measure, even though it doesn’t exactly blow me away either.

OneUI

Alright, I wanna talk about the software next—and once again—do I even need to say anything other than “it runs on One UI?” The latest One UI 8, to be specific? Samsung’s design overhaul with last year’s One UI 7 was so. freaking. good that it has remained my favorite take on Android to this day. The entire thing looks so beautiful, there’s a ton of customization options if I wanna get funky with it, Good Lock app is a holy grail for customizations, and everything feels so optimized and responsive. And since the S25 FE falls under the Galaxy S lineup, it has literally a…ll of Samsung’s AI features as well. Including something to help me write better, something to edit out the unnecessary objects from my photo… the whole nine yards. I’m sure I’ve said this before, but—if you care at all about AI features—Samsung is just at the top of the food chain right now. What’s even more exciting is that the S25 FE also has 7 years of updates to its name. And I don’t know about you, but I’m especially looking forward to the One UI 8.5 update more than anything else. ‘Cause based on everything I’ve seen online, it seems Samsung has really one-upped itself with things like customization and system animations this time.

Performance

Okay, besides excellent software experience, I’m quite happy with its performance too, or let’s say I am not unhappy with its regular performance, but its gaming performance is something that's definitely not flagship. The S25 FE upgrades to the Exynos 2400 chip, which has the most negligible performance jump over the S24 FE’s Exynos 2400e. And while everything feels perfectly snappy and responsive, you and I both know that something like the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 would’ve done wonders for this phone. Which is something I felt the most when I was testing a couple of games here. Because the S25 FE’s gaming results are almost bizarre. So I knew it would struggle with Genshin Impact at the highest settings. And it did. By averaged just 53 fps with consistent frame drops throughout my gameplay. The S25 FE—for some reason—is limited to just 60 fps on PUBG Mobile or just 90 fps on Mobile Legends, which was a little surprising because the Exynos 2400 is very capable of hitting higher fps. I don’t even think Samsung’s putting these barricades in hopes for better thermals because the S25 FE’s thermals are actually pretty great. Samsung says it has used a 10% larger vapor chamber on this thing, and I never felt it warm up unless I was doing something like using mobile data outdoors on a sunny day. So yeah, there’s clearly enough thermal headroom for high-fps gameplay on this guy. And I hope Samsung can fix this with a few software updates.

Battery Life

Now, before I get into its cameras, I wanna talk about its battery life. And no, this phone too, like all Samsung phones, does not have a silicone-carbon battery. The S25 FE has a 4,900 mAh battery—a 200 mAh bump from its predecessor—and I’ve been getting 6–7 hours of screen time on average here, which is not a dealbreaker in any way, but my S25 Ultra definitely provides like 1 to 2 hours more screen time! There is an upgrade in the charging department, now it's 45W, which can give me almost 60% juice after plugging it in for 30 minutes. While a complete refill still takes a little over an hour.

Camera

Alright. That brings me to the cameras. And the first thing you need to know is that the only hardware update the S25 FE has here is with its new selfie shooter; you’re now looking at a slightly higher-res 12MP sensor with a slightly wider f/2.2 lens. The rest of the setup remains exactly the same, which includes a 50MP main, a 12MP ultrawide, and an 8MP telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom. And I can clearly see why Samsung didn’t want to bother with any significant changes in the camera department, because if I had to summarize its cameras into two words, I’d say they’re “eye pleasing”.

Daylight

The S25 FE’s photos have that typical “Samsung” optimization with punchy colors, nice dynamic range, and such a well-balanced look that it makes you forget about editing your pictures before posting them on your socials. No, seriously. Its main camera also retains plenty of details to zoom into, although I can’t say the same about the other two lenses. I mean, they look perfectly fine at a glance, although—once you start pinching in for more—you can clearly see those low-res ultra wide and telephoto sensors giving up.

Lowlight

Which means the nighttime shots from the ultrawide and telephoto cameras aren’t the best I’ve seen. The good news is that Samsung’s night mode at least does a decent job at cleaning up the overblown highlights and the exposure level in general.

Portraits and Selfies

The S25 FE is great with human subjects as well, with nice skin tone and everything else. Like I said before, they’re eye pleasing. I am noticing slightly softer portraits than I expected. But I’ve also found three other issues that Samsung needs to address: The S25 FE’s main camera often adds a warm tone, breaking color consistency. It also struggles with shadow details, especially in ultrawide shots, and takes longer than expected to process low-light photos.

Video

As for videos, the S25 FE can do 4K 60 fps from the main and the selfie camera, with the ultrawide and the telephoto lenses maxing out at 4K 30 fps only. And “eye pleasing” is how I’d like to describe its videos yet again. With nice colors, decent stabilization, and good audio pickup from the built-in mics.

Samsung Galaxy S25 FE Review: Pros and Cons

Pros

• Solid display quality
• Faster charging and decent battery life
• Crisp and Punchy camera

Cons

• NO LTPO refresh rate
• Average gaming performance for the price
• Slightly overpriced

Samsung Galaxy S25 FE Review Conclusion

So, with all that said, the Galaxy S25 FE is priced quite high at NPR 1 lakh, continuing the FE lineup's yearly price-hike trend. While FE phones usually see major price cuts after six months in other markets, Nepal never gets those discounts — even last year’s S24 FE still costs NPR 95,000.

This phone excels with a good display, superb software experience, and equally good cameras. However, if you are a gamer, the Exynos 2400 is definitely not for gaming! But there’s also little to no competition in this price segment, as phones like the Vivo X200 FE or OnePlus 13s haven’t launched here. So, even though the S25 FE feels slightly overpriced, it’s still the only solid option around 1 lakh in Nepal. If it were about 10–12 thousand rupees cheaper, it would’ve been the best value for money.