Samsung’s Galaxy S21 FE brings a critical niche feature to the US: dual SIM card slots to let you carry two cellular subscriptions at once. Outside of that, however, there simply isn’t much reason for this phone to exist. All around, the Galaxy S21 FE very slightly remixes last year’s $799.99 Galaxy S21 at a somewhat lower base price of $699.99. But considering it’s so similar to the previous model and coming out so close to the Galaxy S22 launch, it’s hard to recommend unless you’re specifically looking to buy a dual-SIM phone.
A Familiar Face
The Galaxy S21 FE comes in four attractive colors: dark gray, green, purple, or white. It has the S21’s beautiful basic design, with a matte back panel and the camera bump flush to the upper right corner, as opposed to the “floating” camera bump on the Galaxy S20 FE.
(Photo: Sascha Segan)
At 6.14 by 2.93 by 0.31 inches (HWD), it’s a bit bigger than the standard Galaxy S21 (5.97 by 2.80 by 0.31 inches), although it isn’t as big as the S21 Ultra (6.50 by 2.98 by 0.35 inches). From the front, it’s really difficult to tell it apart from an S20 FE or a base-model S21.
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The phone sports an IP68 waterproof rating and has a 6.4-inch, 120Hz 2,340-by-1,080 display with an optical fingerprint sensor underneath. There is no SD card slot and no standard headphone jack. The S20 FE had a SIM tray with an SD card slot on the other side; the S21 FE exchanges the SD slot for a second SIM tray.
Left to right: Galaxy S21 FE, Galaxy S20 FE
(Photo: Sascha Segan)
Premium Power
Just like the Galaxy S21, the S21 FE uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 processor and runs Android 12 with Samsung’s usual extensions. Our model has 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. There is also a model with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage.
The phone appears to be more aggressively thermally throttled than other Samsung models we’ve tested recently. Our first few benchmark runs gave results looking much more like the S20 series than the S21 series.
Checking with the CPU Throttling Test app, which slams the CPU for 15 minutes, we found the S21 FE throttled back faster and harder than either the S20 FE or the S21 Ultra. But a quick touch to the back of the phone showed the problem wasn’t that it was running hot; it was that the S21 FE’s firmware was keeping it cooler than either the S20 FE or the S21 Ultra. So this intense throttling can change with firmware updates.
In real-life use, the S21 FE got noticeably warm when playing the extremely high-powered mobile game Genshin Impact, and while the controls were very responsive, we felt like the frame rate was slightly jerkier than it should be. We get the feeling that some software optimization is still needed, but that’s what happens when you test a phone before it launches (the S21 FE officially hits store shelves January 11).
The aggressive power management, along with the 1080p screen, helped give the phone good battery life even in 120Hz screen mode. We got 11 hours, 40 minutes of video playback time in our video rundown test, which should make for a full day’s worth of use. The phone’s 4,500mAh battery supports 25W wired and 15W wireless charging.
Network Niceities
The Galaxy S21 FE has a real dual-SIM slot, which is very rare on a phone designed for the US—the slots even say SIM 1 and SIM 2. The model number is SM-G990U1/DS, which in Samsung parlance means “US model, factory unlocked, dual SIM,” which we’ve never seen before. Samsung confirmed that the dual-SIM model will be sold in the US. Carrier-sold models, tagged SM-G990U, have no SIM 2 slot. We’ve been told by carriers that the phone is physically eSIM capable, but may not have that function at launch.
That said, even on our SIM 2-capable model, the second SIM has been disabled in firmware. There is no option in the settings screen for a second SIM (or even an eSIM), and if you load only the second slot, the phone acts like it has no SIM at all. Samsung says it hopes to enable the functionality, but could not give a timeline.
Network-wise, the S21 FE has everything the S21 has and a little more: all models now come with millimeter-wave 5G (the S21 on AT&T and T-Mobile only had mid-band and low-band 5G). Still, AT&T and T-Mobile use so little millimeter-wave 5G, it’s not a big deal.
The SIM 2 insignia marks this as a true dual-SIM slot
(Photo: Sascha Segan)
More importantly, the Qualcomm X60 modem in the S21 FE supports the new C-band networks launching this month from AT&T and Verizon. The Galaxy S20 FE and earlier models didn’t. That can potentially make for big performance differences in 46 major US metro areas.
We recently benchmarked Google’s Pixel 6 Pro against the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra, which uses the same Qualcomm modem as the S21 FE. We found the Qualcomm modem to be superior in terms of signal quality and performance.
As for calls, quality and volume are on par with Samsung’s other recent flagships. Once again, there’s not much new to see here.
A Clear Camera
The S21 FE shares a rear camera system with the S21. Its three rear sensors are a 12MP, 123-degree ultra-wide; a 12MP main; and a 8MP 3x zoom. But its front camera has been majorly amped up, from 10MP on the S21 to 32MP here. We compared it with the S20 FE to see how Samsung has moved forward, especially if you have an older phone.
Daytime shots taken with the S20 FE (left) and the S21 FE (right) are nearly identical
(Photo: Sascha Segan)
The S21 FE’s camera interface, and especially the fluidity of switching cameras, is much smoother than on the S20 FE. That comes down to improvements in the image signal processors on the Snapdragon 888.
All in all, photos taken in decent light on the S20 FE and the S21 FE look identical. The S21 FE has significantly better low-light performance, however, especially on the front camera. Selfies in low light taken with the S20 FE are a blurry mess; they’re much better on the S21 FE. Outdoor shots show noticeably more definition at night on the S21 FE than on the S20 FE.
Night shots on the S21 FE (right) have better definition than on the S20 FE (left)
(Photo: Sascha Segan)
Here’s the thing, though—the same is true of the S21. (The S21’s front-facing camera has fewer megapixels than the S21 FE’s does, but it has similar low-light improvements.) And the S22 might be even better, for not much more money; we’ll see very soon.
Right Phone, Wrong Time?
The S21 FE is a fine phone, but it’s an odd product coming out at an odd time. Last year’s Galaxy S20 FE was a hit for several reasons. The primary S20 line, released right at the beginning of the pandemic, was overpriced and buggy. The S20 FE fixed that, six months later, delivering a reasonably priced phone that worked beautifully.
But the S21 line was terrific, and the S21 FE is coming out right before the S22 launches; the current expectation for the Galaxy S22, which may have a $799 base model with mysterious, fancy new features, is February.
And the Galaxy S22 isn’t the only new Samsung we’ll be seeing within the next few months. The lower-cost Galaxy A33, A43, A53, and A73 are all expected to show up soon, making your Samsung decision a complex one.
Left to right: Galaxy S21 FE, Galaxy S21+, Galaxy S20 FE
(Photo: Sascha Segan)
There’s not much for the FE to fix, and both our testing and the specs show it. There’s little this phone does that a base-model S21 with a price drop doesn’t do in a slightly more compact body. (The two exceptions are dual-SIM functionality and how all S21 FE models include millimeter-wave 5G, but outside of Verizon millimeter-wave is a rare technology, and the Verizon model of the S21 has it.)
Samsung says it’s getting rid of the base-model S21 with the launch of this phone, which means the S21 FE’s existence is probably more about arcane supply chain deals and marginal profit than about giving phone buyers anything new or useful. Once the S22 comes out, we’re betting there will be a ton of lightly used S21 models on the market for less than the S21 FE, and without any real advantages, it seems smarter to pick up an S21 than this model.
If you’re reading this in January and are shopping for a Samsung phone, our advice is to hold tight and wait for the S22 launch. Then we’ll see what new features the S22 family has to offer and how prices on used S21 units drop, potentially below the $699 the S21 FE lists for. If you’re reading this later in the year, we’ll have clearer guidance in our Galaxy S22 review.
That said, the Galaxy S21 FE is a perfectly good phone, and if you need to use two lines at once, it’s currently the only dual-physical-SIM flagship designed for US networks. That alone might be enough to seal the deal for you.
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