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If all you want from a tablet is a screen larger than your phone to stream video, make video calls, surf the web and answer the occasional email, the good news is you don’t need to spend the earth to get something suitable.
Apple charges £329 for its cheapest current generation iPad going right up to more than £1,000 for the latest iPad Pro, while on the Android side of things, Samsung has just announced its £1,199 Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra.
Thankfully there are tablets available in more affordable price brackets. Right now, Argos is selling the Samsung Galaxy Tab A9 for £99, which is a solid £50 discount on its £149 RRP.
For a sliver under £100, you’ll get a basic but functional tablet with an 8.7-inch LCD screen with 64GB internal storage and 4GB RAM. That means you won’t have loads of room for large files, and this device is not best suited for demanding mobile games, but there will be enough space for apps such as Netflix, and room to download some shows and films for offline watching in the car or on a plane.
If you do want to expand the storage to carry around your music or film collection, there’s a microSD card slot.
There’s also an 8MP camera on the back and 2MP on the front bezel so you can install Zoom, WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger or any other Android app to make video calls.
And unlike the £99.99 Amazon Fire HD 8 tablet, which is often a go-to recommendation, the Galaxy Tab A9 can download Google apps. That’s because the £99 Samsung slate runs full Android, so you can download any Android app from the Google Play Store.
All Amazon’s tablets run FireOS, a restricted version of Android that doesn’t have Google apps such as Gmail, YouTube or Google Maps.
You’ll have no such issue on the Tab A9, which at 332g is also light and compact enough to store in a bag and carry around all day. Unlike many high end tablets, it also has a 3.5mm headphone jack if you don’t want to mess around with Bluetooth earphones, plus if you have a Samsung phone you’ll be able to use handy software tools such as Quick Share to send photos, videos and files between both devices.
If you’d rather buy from Samsung directly, the firm is also offering the same 64GB Tab A9 for £99 on its website.
