Galaxy J3 (2016) review: An entry AMOLED phone that became a global carrier and prepaid staple.
The prepaid-carrier volume phone.
Galaxy J3 (2016) was everywhere on prepaid shelves — an AMOLED, a Samsung badge and a removable battery at an entry price. It was never fast, but as a first smartphone or a backup it shipped in huge numbers.
01Display
62/10062/100 — right at the average for budget phones of 2016.
02Camera
46/10046/100 is one of the weaker camera results among budget phones of 2016 — 10 points under the average. Check the rows below before buying for this.
03Performance
38/10038/100 is one of the weaker performance results among budget phones of 2016 — 11 points under the average. Check the rows below before buying for this.
04Battery
58/10058/100 is one of the weaker battery results among budget phones of 2016 — 10 points under the average. Check the rows below before buying for this.
05Build
50/10050/100 is one of the weaker build results among budget phones of 2016 — 9 points under the average. Check the rows below before buying for this.
06Value
52/10052/100 is one of the weaker value results among budget phones of 2016 — 12 points under the average. Check the rows below before buying for this.
- AMOLED at a true entry price.
- Removable battery.
- Widely sold on prepaid carriers.
- microSD + jack.
- Very slow chipset.
- 8 MP camera.
- No software updates.
- 1.5 GB RAM.
How this review is built: every section score, spec row and comparison on this page comes from SpecEagle's tracked catalogue — scores weight measured specs against the 57-phone cohort of budget devices released around the same time. We don't publish invented lab anecdotes. Spot an error? .