Review: Samsung E820

Samsung E820 Review

Phone rating:

The Samsung E820 is a minor variation on the Samsung E800 and the review comments for the E800 apply to the E820 too.

We originally awarded the E820 4 stars, but following persistent reports by users of a variety of problems in the E800/E810/E820 series, we have downgraded it to 2 stars. There are a number of problems with the phones - first there seem to be real problems with the phone dropping calls, shutting down in the middle of calls and refusing to send or receive text messages. Secondly, the E800/E810/E820 series seems to be a lot less reliable than other Samsung phones, with reports of it freezing, the screen breaking and other kinds of hardware failures. We would recommend that you avoid the E820 and either go for the Samsung D500, or if your budget doesn't allow for that, then choose one of Samsung's clamshell phones such as the E600 or E330 instead.

Features of the Samsung E820 include:

• 65,536 colour TFT screen (128 x 160 pixels)
• VGA camera (640 x 480 resolution) with digital zoom, photo effects & frames and multishot feature (up to 15 pictures)
• 64-voice polyphonic ringtones
• Wallpaper & screensaver (supported formats: JPEG, GIF & AGIF, WBMP, PNG) - 8 images + 5 animations embedded
• SMS (with learning T9 support), MMS, EMS
• Phonebook (maximum 1000 entries)
• Photo Caller ID (view the image of the person calling you, before you answer the call)
• Downloadable Java games (2 embedded games: Snowball Fight, BubbleSmile)
• Memory: 22 Mbytes for photos, sounds and MMS, 1.3 Mbytes for games
• Organiser functions: Clock, worldtime, alarm (auto switch on, when phone is off), calendar, scheduler, to-do list, currency converter, calculator, countdown timer, stop watch
• Data Transfer: IrDa, fax, PC serial cable transfer
• Syncronisation software: Easy Studio version 1.0
• Vibration alert
• Memory: 22 Mbytes
• WAP, GPRS class 10
• Dual Band (GSM 900 + 1800MHz)
• Size: 87 x 45 x 24 mm
• Weight: 85g
• Talk time: 2.5 hours
• Battery standby: 5 days

Samsung E820 Consumer Reviews

Love your mobile? Hate it? Please share your experiences to help other people choose the phone that's best for them. Please do not review this phone if you have not used it. This is a review site, not a forum, so please don't just ask questions. Please do not use swear words or offensive language, and please, no advertising!

Average rating from 60 reviews:

Reviewed by Emre from TUR on 4th Nov 2007
I had this phone to, it made me crazy you saw an black screen and you can't call someone. so i throw that phone away/
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Reviewed by hosse from uk on 1st Sep 2007
i've had this mobile for more than two years now. the thing is the max use for this mobile is just one year.i had problems like freezing screen, blank screen,infared,txt,and so on. i treat myself with a pimp of the century nokia 8800 18ct gold.
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Reviewed by 123 from uk on 30th Aug 2007
this phone is small n cute but the battire is short, and it lacks bluetooth. my infared doesnt work. no internet connection, cannot dwload ringtones or pic.
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Reviewed by mike from england on 29th May 2007
i got this phone 6 months ago i got this phone becase my sumsug E900 broke so becase it was cheap and i dont no why i wasted my money on the E900 this phone is proble one of the best phones
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Reviewed by sneh from uk on 9th May 2007
i got this phone for like nothing has ever happened expect the colur fussed out n i had to switch the phone off and on it again but i dont understand why every1 hates it.
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Reviewed by Arben from UK on 4th Mar 2007
I used this phone for 4 months 2 years ago and i can tell you its slick but its the fastest self destructing phone i have ever had. haha little advice dont bother purchasing it!!
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Reviewed by delila from bosnia and herzegovina on 11th Feb 2007
i bought samsung e820,10 months ago,but now it doesnt work.the mobile is turned on,but when you calling it is showning that it is turn off.i hate this mobile.never buy this phone ,it is awful
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Reviewed by sheila from ghana on 10th Jan 2007
i have used this phone one and half years. its gone for repairs thrice .screen has gone off 3 times. apart from the screen problems and the fact that it has no blue tooth it is a great phone
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Reviewed by Muhammad Muzammil from Pakistan on 7th Dec 2006
I am using the same phone since last two months. It is working very fine. I dont have any problem till now.
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Reviewed by Jem from UK on 30th Aug 2006
Worst phone I have every had the screan went weird you had to unlock it when the slide was down otherwise it would go all weird. Samsungs are my favourite phone i have only ever had one different phone that was the sony erricson k700i worst phone. This was defferently the worst samsung phone though.
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Reviewed by Lola from England on 5th Aug 2006
hey! this phone is gud n hardwearing. i wud recommend it 4 teenz. sumtims tha screen smudges bt jus tke da battery off n put it bac on again n tis fine. btw.....wheres da voice recorder? da onli way 2 access it is thru multi msg!?
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Reviewed by abbi from scotland on 23rd Apr 2006
ive had this fone a few days now n aat first i frt it wz amazin. now i'm nt so sure. its a bit to square in shape tho so a bit hard to fit in ma poket. i dnt reali fnk its worth al that muni n i fnk samsung fones have taken a step bak as they av produced mne ova fones of higher quality. but cameras gd video gd screen quality gd i jus dnt dnt no bout ova functions n style. mayb its jus nt a gals fone?? XxabbixX
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Reviewed by ro-d from nederland on 31st Mar 2006
Love this phone, its basically just a cheaper version of the D500. Its slim, sleak, got great picture and sound on it. Its really nice with the blue ring around the screen, thats the best colour. I like this phone alot because the phone itself is not all that expensive, its a beautiful model and desrves the full 5 stars
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Reviewed by -x-[Nat]-x from England on 27th Feb 2006
I had this phone for just over a year until i started experiencing the same troubles such as a blank screen, problems with texts etc. I am on contract and also took out insurance... so i took it back to the shop. Apparently these problem are due to water damage which can occur by using your phone in the rain, taking your phone into the bathroom when having a shower due to the steam and so on...luckily because of my insurance they gave me a D500 to replace it which i am happy with. To conclude before these problems occured with the phone I thought it was quite a nicely designed phone, light weight anf with all the necessary features on it therfore I am rating it as quite a good phone its not the best but still a pleasure to use. =o)
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Reviewed by Rinus from The Netherlands on 27th Feb 2006
I have this phone in my possesion for 1 year now and I don't have any problems with it, everything works fine.
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Reviewed by Dick Williams from UK on 9th Feb 2006
Useless peice of junk.
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Reviewed by Ally from Uk on 2nd Feb 2006
I have had this phone for 4 months and it was fine for the first few months, now it drops out of calls, wont send messages or receive some calls.
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Reviewed by Saqib from UK on 27th Jan 2006
Absolutely junk (that includes the design)
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Reviewed by charl from uk on 15th Jan 2006
my phone worked ok until the garuntee ran out :-( then the camera broke .. said preview error, then it stoped getting signal, now the screen is blank all the time and is completely usless, not worth buying! you can get something alot better for the same kinda money!
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Reviewed by Rachella from Australia on 15th Jan 2006
Nice little phone, beautiful screen and sounds. Bit hard to use keypad as the keys hidden by the slider are not raised, so wouldn't really be easy for a guy with big fingers to use. One other annoying thing is that you can't have the time displayed constantly in standby mode - it will flash every 7 seconds, or more if you choose, but not constantly - hard when you're trying to sleep! Other than that, I love it! Samsung phones are brilliant (I've had 3 of them now)!
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Reviewed by R from UK on 22nd Nov 2005
Ive had my phone since July 2004 and until recently its been great. However my friend bought it at the same time and experienced many problems such as the blank screen problem. Recently I have been getting reception problems telling me I have limited service. i went to a phone shop and they said its cos I have an old SIM, so i got a new one. I still have the same problem and am unable to use my phone most of the day. I too am going to complain.
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Reviewed by Godmode from Lithuania on 10th Nov 2005
First of all I agree people who told that this phone doesnt work properly. I have also Samsung E820 and it doesnt work good. I agree that its design is really great but its problems with screen makes me really angry about it...first of all its scren can go absolutely blank whenever it wants and it comes back also when it thinks it is nesecery...the screen can start changing views when you open or close it...also it is bad because its camera cannot go into filming mode and because you cannot send pictures by IrDa to any other phone...its IrDa is working vice versa other phones....tomorow I am going to the firm which sold me it and they will have to fix all the problems otherwise they will have to give me back my money...
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Reviewed by iva from bih on 30th Oct 2005
dont buy it
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Reviewed by Aroa from England, Birmingham on 26th Oct 2005
I've had my phone for ten months now. I liked it a lot,butn ow it freezes, it cuts my calls, the battery runs out very fast, and I've had some weirder problems. My camera has gone inverted and psychadelic- it won't let me save photos and there's white noise everywhere. The screen cuts up into lines and blurs, it doesn't change screen properly when I press a button. The number buttons randomly stop working. It turns itself back onto loud mode. It "crashes" like a computer, then restarts itself. It turns itself onand off without asking for my PIN. It's a very strange phone, and also rather hard to text on. It's nice until it starts messing up. I miss my Nokia 3310. :(
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Reviewed by Hester from England on 13th Oct 2005
Would not recommend it! Its a pretty, light and cute phone but very un-reliable. It started after about 1/2 year, the screen would freeze for a while which is very frustrating if you need to make a phone call.....Lately (I've had my phone for 10 month) the screen just goes blank, and no matter what you do it stays blank (you can still make phone calls if you know the number by heart....) until it decides to come back again. The longest wait I've had is about 1 hour, but now again my screen is blank (its been over an hour now actually) and all I can do is wait to see if it decides to ever come back again......so please don't buy this phone, its not worth the stress!
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Reviewed by _ from united kingdom on 18th Sep 2005
its an ecellent phone with wonderful camra!
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Reviewed by elise from America on 24th Aug 2005
I don't under stand what is wrong with this phone it is great it's light weight and there are lots of great features
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Reviewed by Toni from UK on 5th Aug 2005
i don't understand all these complaints about the E820 i've had mine for over a year and never had a single problem with it plus it was virtually indestructable the amount of times i dropped i expected it to break. i would recommend this fone and am passing mine along to a family member that is how well it works.
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Reviewed by Olisa,Ifeanyichukwu Oladele(Mr.) from Nigeria on 4th Aug 2005
When I saw it first,it was like waow!But as with all samsung phones the screen just went bizarre in less than 3 months.I am having to spend money to repair it,when I am not sure it would work.Samsung should strive on improving the durability of their LCD screens.
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Reviewed by chelsea from uk on 2nd Aug 2005
i have had this fone for about 7 months now and already the camera doesnt work it started to freeze and jump you cannot take a picture as when you go to take the picture it says file capture error, save error also it freezes alot of the time. Also i put my fone on silent and the vibration you get to alert you its gone on silent wouldnt stop it vibrating for about 10 minutes and then finally stopped. Overall i think this fone is only as popular beacuse its a slide fone if the things you had or didnt have was on a simple fone it wouldnt be as popular. i mean it dusnt have blue tooth it doesnt have video recordin on it it dusnt have much!!. dnt buy save ya money n get somethin betta!!
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Reviewed by - from UK on 21st Jul 2005
I dont understand why the administrators of this site have lowered the ratings for the E820 and E810. It was only the E800 which was having problems and they were network related (O2). O2 were also having problems with SonyEricsson K700i and S700i. The S700i was eventually removed from their network but they've fixed the problems with the K700i and E800. There was never any problem with the E820 which is only available on T-Mobile and the E810 which is exclusive to Vodafone.
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Reviewed by lisa from england on 18th Jul 2005
OMG its great!!! I've had this fone for 1 year and its excellent! there have been no problems at all. it is stylish, sexy and cool!
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Reviewed by jack from uk on 11th Jul 2005
Had this phone for almost a year now. It's nothing special except for the luxurious design. I dont agree with the other reviewers about reliabilty or quality cos that's actually one of the strong points of this particular model but like i said it's nothing special when it comes to features which is why i give it 4 stars.
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Reviewed by eric from ghana on 6th Jun 2005
I am cery disappointed in the e820 samsung phone. Before i rated it a five star phone but i think i have every right to drop it to a one star bcos apart from the dropping of calls, freezing and all the associated problems it can not send or receive anything, i mean either text messages, ring tonnes, pictures, etc using the infrared feature. I am disappointed and i think very soon i will drop this phone in my rubbish bin.
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Reviewed by kim from england on 28th May 2005
i only got this phone this morning but it is so easy to use it is easier when you investigate rather than reading the manual as you take it in more and it is much more fun i love this phone!!!!!!!!!!!!!! _~*~_
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Reviewed by lewis from stoke-on-trent on 24th May 2005
This is a gorgeous little phone with out-standingly good lookes i would advise anyone to GET THIS PHONE!!!!!!!!!! i had one on the first day it came out and i have not regreted it since!!! this is a small phone but it is a smart phone, it has some of the best games and good displayes around today!! trust me this is a wondrful phone and i love it 100/100
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Reviewed by Chris from Manchester on 6th May 2005
I've has this phone for 9 months now and although i am very bored with it i'm still waiting for a descent phone to come out that would be a worthy replacement for this. I have thought about the D500 and E720 but didnt find their designs as good as this or the e800. But i'm in no rush as i havent had any problems with it so far, call quality/reception is better than my old nokia, the screen is amazing and i still have plenty of memory space available. The only problem is the lack of bluetooth but i guess samsung will have something interesting on the market by summer.
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Reviewed by jemm from holland on 12th Apr 2005
my father says 'great phone'
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Reviewed by SuRiYa from London on 7th Apr 2005
Well a fone is a fone right.wen i got dis fone, i luved it but now lukin at all da fones out now and comparing it, it stil is a decent fone.wen i got it, da only fing i wanted on dis fone was blu tooth.now dat da d500 is out n in ma hand, i still luv em both.got da 6230, e700, 6250 n many others im a fone maniac but i luv it n da d500 is a phat fone dun u think.on the whole the e820 is still a phat fone. jus da luks n da features it has is gud enough for me.enjoy life n ya fones.respect
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Reviewed by kate from uk on 6th Apr 2005
the jazzter or woteva ur name is explore da fone!!! it dusnt keep buzzin until u read it go on phone settings and change it its so simple. i think the phones great and i find it easy 2 txt on
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Reviewed by charl from england on 22nd Mar 2005
i like this phone because its cheap so i could afford it.its smalls n cute. would of bin nice with bluetooth but has infar red so don't matter too much even though i don't av a clue ow 2 use it.
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Reviewed by ashton from england on 11th Mar 2005
You lot are dipsticks man most of the problems is cos ya cnt use it you all daft cos you can do most da fings dis phones mental SO GET A BRAIN READ DA INSTRUCTIONS NOT FOR BEGINNERS
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Reviewed by fred from UK on 3rd Mar 2005
most pleasing. no blue toof thou
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Reviewed by don from nigeria on 28th Feb 2005
this fone is chasisssss
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Reviewed by GRACE from UK on 23rd Feb 2005
THIS PHONE IS RUBBISH DONT BUY ONE
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Reviewed by apple from england on 23rd Feb 2005
So CoooooooooooL~~~!!
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Reviewed by Lauzipops from England on 15th Feb 2005
i fink this is a gd fone, it luks gd n has loads a gr8 features 2. jst frm the pic n features it luks apealin. gd fone, gd job Samsung!
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Reviewed by chloe from england on 28th Jan 2005
jazzter u can turn it so it onli vibrates once the fing i dnt like about this phone is i can't find out how to stop the tone when switchin the fone on/off also it would be better with mp3
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Reviewed by Pedro from Scotland on 26th Jan 2005
Julie's write an MP3 player and this thing would be the complete bomb of a mobile.
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Reviewed by The Jazzter from UK on 24th Jan 2005
Flamin' nightmare to use... sure it looks the part but so does Katie Price and she's as useful! Awkward to text, no distribution lists and it keeps buzzing till you read the text... not good in the middle of the night if u forget to switch it off! Too complex a toy... all singin 'n dancin but ringin n' textin' least of its priorities..Am I unreasonable to expect this of a phone?
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Reviewed by sucker from laker on 9th Jan 2005
i hate tthis mobile phone i gave it a star because i coundnt give it a 0
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Reviewed by Musarat Khartoon from England on 8th Jan 2005
This phone is small and stylish. it fits in the pocket without showin a big bulge. its got fantastic photo quality and ringtone sound could have been better with bluetooth but hey its still good.
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Reviewed by daniel from england on 7th Jan 2005
This phone is wicked, it looks cool, has a fab camera and sounds good 2! I luv it but it aint perfect, y cant samsung put a video on it!!!!!!!!!! they put it on the E600 and now the E820 wich is newer and more up2d8 hasn't got a video. Also why hasn't it got bluetooth!!!???!!??!?!
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Reviewed by julie from scotland on 6th Jan 2005
the only thing missing is an mp3 player
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Reviewed by Mr.Gore from UK on 5th Jan 2005
The best mobile design I have ever seen.The mobile is an outstanding phone.It takes pictures and it has its own voice recorder.Thanks Mr.Gore
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Reviewed by Seb from England on 21st Dec 2004
Love this phone, its basically just a cheaper version of the D500. Its slim, sleak, got great picture and sound on it. Its really nice with the blue ring around the screen, thats the best colour. I like this phone alot because the phone itself is not all that expensive, its a beautiful model and desrves the full 5 stars
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Reviewed by eric from Ghana on 21st Dec 2004
its an excellent fon with all the modern technology. I can now say i am now using a cell fon. But it will have been more nicer with a bluetooth.
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Reviewed by Bjornulf Reinsbakk from Norway on 17th Dec 2004
I likt the E820 because its small and hady...good camera very good sound.
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Reviewed by john from united kingdom on 28th Nov 2004
not had this phone yet, but after reading the spec, its once again like the e700. very good phone, compact and stylish, but could have been perfect if only they had BLUETOOTH.
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Reviewed by - from Finland on 24th Nov 2004
The phone is really cool, I had a Nokia N-Gage, but it was junk, I mean, it only had games, it sucked. A phone is cool with cameras, but phones like N-Gage has no point. Just go home and play games, why bother why a phone to play games?
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Samsung E820 Links