The best mid-range phones are closer to flagships than ever before, and although Black Friday and Christmas sales are over, there are still plenty of great deals to be found on affordable handsets.
You might have to give up on luxuries like waterproofing or wireless charging (though some of these phones have those!) but you can get top processors, amazing battery life, fast charging, and slick multi-lens cameras at some surprisingly affordable prices.
If you want to know more about why we recommend these phones, check out our list of the best mid-range phones to find out how we rank them all at full price. And if your budget is a little different, then look at our separate guides to the best flagship phone deals and best budget phone deals.
Best mid-range phone deals
2. Honor 50 (6GB + 128GB)
Buy the new Honor mid-ranger from the official store right now and you’ll not only save £50 on the asking price, but the company will also throw in a free case worth £25.
3. OnePlus Nord 2 5G (8GB RAM, 128GB)
This isn’t the biggest discount we’ve ever seen on the Nord 2, but it’s the best we can find right now on what we think is the best mid-range phone you can buy.
5. OnePlus Nord CE
The Nord CE is OnePlus’ reimagining of the company’s original top-notch mid-ranger from 2020, focusing on a slim build, great display and respectable performance – and you can save a decent £30 on either model.
6. Samsung Galaxy A52s (6GB+128GB)
Now: £334.99 (£74.01 off)
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Samsung’s star mid-ranger for 2021 – the upgraded Galaxy A52s – features a 120Hz AMOLED display, 5G, a 25W fast-charging 4500mAh battery, IP67 water and dust resistance, and a quad rear camera.
Amazon previously had £81 off the device, but now the £74 discount is the biggest you’ll find.
Mid-range phone buying advice
Mid-rangers are typically a mix of competitively-priced fully-fledged flagships, more affordable members of the same product family as a company’s top device with reduced performance, or a dedicated device, designed to deliver a certain premium feature (or features), without breaking the bank.
Deciding which one best suits your needs falls to a number of factors. If you want raw performance, a former flagship will stand you in better stead but will more likely suffer more from waning software support sooner than less powerful but newer dedicated mid-ranger compatriots.
Flagship-adjacent phones will try and offer the closest experience to a product line’s true top-tier offering but will likely skimp on the processor and/or RAM available. While dedicated mid-rangers don’t aim to excel based on their price point, save for one or two key areas, chosen by the manufacturer.
As ever, buying from phone makers you trust is always the way you go, even if it means paying a little more for a similarly-specced phone. Bigger companies’ products are usually held to higher quality standards and should anything go wrong, they’ll likely offer more robust customer support.
How to find deals
If you’re looking to buy a phone outright, rather than on-contract, Amazon has some of the biggest bargains, but make sure you check the specs carefully – third-party sellers sometimes use Amazon to shift international stock, which may vary slightly from what you find locally.
If you find that you’re missing out on Amazon’s Lightning deals, which run for just a few hours and offer limited stock, we’d recommend signing up for Amazon’s 30-day free trial of Prime, which will get you access to deals 30 minutes before everyone else. Plus, you’ll get free next-day delivery with the Prime trial, as well as access to Prime Instant Video and more. Sign up for Prime now.
If you want to know more about the current mid-range phone market, check out our best mid-range phones roundup or if all the entries here still seem a little too pricey, have a look at our best budget phones roundup instead, where every entry costs under £250/$350. We also have a general roundup of the UK’s best tech deals right now, worth checking in on too.
