Samsung has today officially announced the Galaxy S23 FE, Galaxy Tab S9 FE and Galaxy Buds FE in the country. These are the company’s latest devices and join the flagship S23 series, the midrange A series and the foldable Z series from early this year.
Samsung Galaxy S23 FE
The S23 FE borrows a lot of design and spec features from its flagship S23 lineup. It comes with a glass back and aluminium frames with the display and the rear protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5 instead of Victus+. It retains the IP68 rating from the S23 series.
It’s worth noting that Samsung skipped the S22 FE from last year.
The display is the same albeit less bright at 1450 nits. This is a 6.4″ AMOLED screen with a 120Hz refresh rate and HDR10+ support. It fits between the regular S23’s 6.1″ display and the S23+’s 6.6″ display regarding screen size.
There are four colours to choose from – Mint, Silver, Grey, and Lavender.
Samsung switches up Snapdragon for their in-house processor as we get Exynos 2200 chipset powering the S23 FE. It comes paired with 8GB RAM and storage starting at 128/256GB.
Baked right in is Android 13 and OneUI 5.1 and Samsung has promised up to four Android OS upgrades and five years of security updates.
For optics, we get a triple setup of cameras stacked in a floating design headlined by a 50MP main with Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), same primary camera as the main S23 and S23+, 8MP telephoto(3X optical zoom) and 12MP ultra-wide. The setup supports up to 8K 24fps video recording.
For selfies, we have a 10MP front-facing camera instead of the 12MP found in the main S23 series.
The S23 FE brings nightography and advanced digital image stabilization (VDIS) for better photo and video recording.
S23 FE ships with a 4500mAh battery and support for 25W charging.
It will be available starting October 27th and will go for Ksh 99,999 at authorized Samsung dealer stores.
Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE and FE+
The Tab S9 FE tablets are the affordable versions of the Tab S9 from early this year.
Both the S9 FE and FE+ ship with Samsung’s Exynos 1380 processor which doesn’t compare with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy of the Tab S9 series.
They get glass fronts and aluminium backs and frames and support the S pen. They are also rated IP68 for water and dust resistance.
The Tab S9 FE has a 10.9-inch LCD screen with a 90Hz refresh rate and a resolution of 1440 by 2304 pixels(WUXGA). The FE+ has a 12.4-inch LCD screen as well with a 90Hz refresh rate and a resolution of 1600 by 2560 pixels(WUXGA+). The flagship Tab S9 had an 11-inch AMOLED screen with 120Hz refresh rate and Corning Gorilla Glass protection.
The two tablets come with Android 13 and OneUI 5.1. Just like the S23 FE, you get up to four Android OS upgrades and five years of security updates.
The entry-level S9 FE has 6/8GB RAM and either 128/256GB storage expandable up to 1TB with an external microSD card.
The main camera is an 8MP wide with 4k 30fps video recording capabilities while the selfie camera is a 12MP ultrawide. The FE+ has dual 8MP main cameras with a wide and an ultrawide plus a 12MP selfie camera.
Inside is an 8000mAh battery and a 10900mAh battery for the FE and FE+ respectively. Both support 45W charging.
The two come with stereo speakers tuned by AKG with Dolby Atmos support and in four colours – Lavender, Mint, Silver, and Grey.
They will be available starting October 27th at authorized Samsung dealer stores.
Galaxy Buds FE
Unlike the original Buds 2 and Buds 2 Pro earbuds, the Buds FE come with a flatter design and wingtips to help them sit well and tight in your ears when moving around. They come with Active Noise Cancellation, Ambient Sound, three microphones and BlueTooth 5.2 BLE.
Samsung says that the buds have really good battery life as you can get 6 hours with ANC enabled and up to 8 hours on normal mode – the case gives you 21 hours and 30 hours respectively.
A single tap connects the buds to any of your other Samsung devices and support auto-switching when you’re logged in with the same Samsung account. This seamless connection means you can get notified when you leave them behind through SmartThings Find and Lost Mode is activated.
The Buds FE lack wireless charging and are rated IPX2. They come in White and Graphite.
They will be available starting October 27th at authorized Samsung dealer stores.
Samsung Galaxy Z Flip6 FE and Z Fold6 FE
Samsung is switching to its FE strategy not only for the flagship S series(S23 FE) but now for the Z series as well.
It is rumoured that starting next year, the Foldables will see a two-time release – one for the premium flagship versions and a later one for the more affordable FE versions. This means we might see a Galaxy Z Flip6 FE and Z Fold6 FE launch months later.
