January was a big month for Samsung as the company launched its Galaxy S25 series of flagship phones. But equally important are three new phones that have launched in the last few days — Galaxy A56 5G, Galaxy A36 5G and Galaxy A26 5G. Not everyone wants to pay a premium for Galaxy S phones, yet they want to experience some of the flagship features. And that’s where the three new phones come in.

“We have redesigned all of them, ground up. It’s an absolutely new awesome design. Galaxy A56 and A36 are the slimmest A series phones we have launched,” Aditya Babbar (vice-president), MX Business, Samsung India, told The Telegraph.

Galaxy A56 and Galaxy A36 measure just 7.4 mm in thickness. It’s not just about making the phone slim… there’s sturdiness involved. The solid metal frame and Corning Gorilla Glass Victus+ make the design of, say, Galaxy A56 look great. The same level of protection is also on the A36.

But where the phones can truly score points are artificial intelligence-related features. Many brands restrict them to flagship devices but Samsung has taken a different route. They are calling it Awesome Intelligence.

Akshay Rao (general manager) and Aditya Babbar (vice-president), MX Business, Samsung India, unveil Galaxy A56 5G and Galaxy A36 5G

“If you look at the Galaxy A series, it has always been democratising the flagship phone experience. We started Nightography, for example, some years ago in flagship phones. Now, it’s a feature that’s there on more phones. Today, we are democratising AI. In fact, Galaxy A26 will be the most affordable phone to have AI,” said Babbar.

Plenty of Awesome Intelligence features are available on Galaxy A56 5G and Galaxy A36 5G. Google’s enhanced Circle to Search makes it easier than ever to search and discover from the phone’s screen. With the recent enhancements to Circle to Search, users can also instantly search for the songs they hear without switching apps.

Awesome Intelligence also features a range of intelligent visual editing features like Auto Trim, Best Face, Instant Slo-mo and many others. Auto-Trim is a flagship-level AI feature that is now getting democratised with Galaxy A56. The new smartphones also come with Object Eraser, allowing users to remove unwanted distractions from photos. Filters option enables custom filter creation by extracting colours and styles from existing photos for users to apply for a unique and personalised effect depending on mood and taste.

Samsung has spent considerable time redesigning the camera. Take the case of Galaxy A56 and Galaxy A36 smartphones featuring a 50MP main lens and 10-bit HDR front lens recording for bright and crisp selfies. Galaxy A56 5G comes with a 12MP ultra-wide lens and brings enhancements to Nightography, with Low Noise Mode making its way to the 12MP selfie camera along with additional wide camera support to capture stunning content in low-light settings.

“Another area that is seeing a flagship-like shine is performance. We have improved the vapour chamber in all the devices. Second, all the devices will offer excellent performance.” Galaxy A56 is powered by the Exynos 1580 chipset and Galaxy A36 runs on the Snapdragon 6 Gen 3 Mobile Platform.

“The largest install base of mobiles in the industry is the Galaxy A series. What we have learned over the years is that consumers don’t want compromises. They are looking for the best of everything. That is why we are giving a top-quality screen, flagship-like AI, a new design, a 12GB variant… there is so much,” added Babbar.

After making a strong start to the year, Samsung hopes to carry its advantage in the smartphone race. “We are very excited. We have already launched eight to nine phones in the past few weeks. Let’s look in terms of two indicators — volume and value. Volume, we feel, that in the last three-four years it has been pretty consistent. Value is where the consumer is demanding more and paying more. Last year, we tackled the value aspect well and this year we want to continue growing faster in terms of value. And the Galaxy A series phones will help.”

At a glance

• Samsung Galaxy A56 5G is priced upwards of ₹ 41,999 and comes in olive, light grey and graphite.

• Samsung Galaxy A36 5G is priced upwards of ₹ 32,999 and it comes in black, lavender and white.