Ten 4G smartphones for under R700 in South Africa

The most affordable 4G/LTE smartphones in South Africa in July 2024 are priced between R600 and R700.

South Africa plans to completely shut down 2G and 3G networks by the end of 2027 after previously setting more ambitious deadlines, which much of the industry believed were unrealistic.

Many poorer people in the country still rely on cheaper 3G cellphones, and many Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices run on 2G connectivity.

Even if South Africa only meets the 2027 deadline, it will be significantly ahead of many other countries—including the United Kingdom (UK), which plans to completely shut down these older technologies by 2033.

European countries have different timelines for their 2G and 3G shutdowns, with some having switched off one or the other.

In France, for example, Orange plans to shut down 2G by 2025, with its 3G switch-off set for 2028.

In Germany, all mobile networks switched off their 3G connectivity in 2021. However, 2G is expected to remain available on at least one network — Vodafone — until 2030.

The United States (US) is ahead of the curve, with all four of its major networks shutting down 3G in 2022 and the last network to keep a 2G network active — T-Mobile — set to decommission the technology sometime this year.

South Africa aims to repurpose the radio frequency spectrum used by 2G and 3G networks for newer technologies, which not only support faster speeds but are also more spectrally efficient.

Therefore, the 2G and 3G shutdown should give mobile networks more raw cellular capacity to work with, improving service quality and reducing mobile communication costs in the long run.

While this is great news for the wider industry, it will render the most affordable 3G-only smartphones useless.

Therefore, buying a 4G smartphone is a more future-proof investment.

4G also offers a far better experience when using data-heavy applications like video streaming.

MyBroadband looked for the most affordable 4G smartphones in South Africa and found ten options priced at R599 or R699.

These were available from Hisense, Itel, Mobicel, and Stylo.

These devices’ storage capacities ranged from 8GB to 32GB, while RAM varied between 1GB, 2GB, and 4GB.

On paper, the specifications of the Stylo Swift 4G seemed to be the best.

In addition to having the most RAM and highest megapixel count on its main rear camera, it also offered the second-largest capacity battery of 2,950mAh.

The only smartphone with a better battery pack — the Mobicel Epic — had 3GB less RAM.

All the smartphones were network-locked to either Vodacom or MTN.

Restricting users to their networks intends to help recoup any subsidies networks carried to reduce the cost of the devices.

After a year, a user will be able to request that their device be unlocked to other networks.

The ten cheapest 4G smartphones in South Africa are summarised below.

Hisense U31 — R599 (Pep Cellular)

Hisense U607 — R599 (Pep Cellular)

Mobicel F41 — R599 (Ackermans Connect)

Mobicel Force — R599

Mobicel Neo Plus — R599 (Ackermans Connect)

Stylo Swift 4G — R599 (Pep Cellular)

Hisense U963 — R699 (Ackermans Connect)

Hisense U964 — R699 (Ackermans Connect)

Itel V52 — R699 (Pep Cellular)

Mobicel Epic — R699 (Pep Cellular)