I bought my current phone for equivalent of 150 USD this year. I flashed lineage os immediately and without bloatware it is running pretty smooth. I am pretty happy with it.
I wait for a good discount (because they always come eventually) and buy the flagship. I'm too embarassed to give the figure based on the other answers here, though. I've just always had bad experiences with the lower end that when looking over a long period, I've barely saved, since I'd had to upgrade it more often. I guess I haven't given the lower end a chance for about 12 years, so things might have changed.
I've been on the pixel A train the past few years, and wait until they offer me >$300 for a trade in. I got a 3A for I think ~$300 or so in 2020, and a 6A for $150 in 2022. Almost jumped to an 8a which would have been like $200 I think but there's no reason to really besides shiny new toy so I'm holding out for another year or two in hopes a 4a-style size reduction comes again
I buy strictly second hand and spend around 70€, never more than 100€. Life is good a few generations behind, the phones I get are still absolutely adequate to daily drive. I use LineageOS with mostly open source apps, no games, no google. I have a Pixel 4a at the moment, the camera is more than enough to keep some memories. My phone is rather a sturdy tool than a toy and status symbol, I really like it like that!
I would never spend over A$1000 (~US$675) on a phone unless Fairphone started selling here in Australia. I would pay more for their phones for ethical reasons and because their support period is so long. I always buy second-hand these days so that tends to lower the price significantly.
Whenever a refurbished Pixel phone is about $3-400and I'm 2+ generations behind and want something new. I rock no case too, bare naked phones, so if I drop it and it's screen cracks, I'm not out much $. Been my plan since the Nexus line.
If you shop on the Google store, put a phone in your cart and wait a week they send out ridiculous discount coupons. I got a 7 pro for 400 just after the 8 was released. Brand new, no trade in required.
Normally cases and screen protectors aren't worth it but I have to say depending on the phone, adding some sort of ridge to the border of the screen can essentially keep it from cracking in almost all scenarios.
I do see a lot of worthless cases and wasted money though for sure.
Price is not the only factor for me: deGoogled is priority number one, and repairability is not far behind.
With that in mind, I'd pay a lot of money for a rather average phone because that's exactly what I got: yesterday's phone at today's price. But I got what I wanted and I'm happy with it. So the price was right.
I like smaller phones that do not compromise too much on the usability. I got my S23 256GB for 700CAD taxes in in may last year, and I think this is a fair price. So I'll go with 600-800 taxes in!
Same here, gets you an adequate phone which will last me at least 3 to 4 years. (I usually have to buy new because I broke the old one through my own fault)
I try to adjust my budget for things based on how much time i spend using them. My glasses, bed, phones, and shoes have very little (relative to my budget) expenses spared. My most recent purchase was a pixel 8, back when it was relatively new around at around 700$. I plan on putting grapheneos on it at some point and keeping it for as long as i can reasonably get away with.
Before that, it was the samsung s20fe 5g, also at around seven or eight hundred. I used it without a case for two years and the screen broke too early for me to be entirely happy with it. Im treating my pixel a lot better in hopes that doesnt happen again.
About $200 for a used flagship from a couple years ago. I currently have a oneplus 9 I bought used last year and it's completely fine, there's nothing important I'm missing from any higher end phone
Normally 400€, but because of the Fairphone, I spend a little extra (700€) because it is just such a great phone if you are even slightly technically inclined. That will last a whole lot longer than any of my previous phones.
I mean 15€ for an entire new usb-c port that you install yourself is just a steal.
My current phone (late 2022) cost me 700€, I will never spend that much again. It was supposed to replace my main camera for photography while hiking (weight being a huge factor), and it has. I'm hoping it will last as long as possible (10 years would be great), but after that, I'll probably just get a 100€ brick out of privacy concerns
I don't think I have ever paid more than $300 for one.
I bought a pixel 3a discounted to $300 when it was maybe a year old. Then when the 6a came out, I was able to trade in the 3a for a $300 credit, so ended up getting the 6a for maybe $150.
Before that, I had a Nexus 5 which I also bought at $300 and held onto for years.
Anywhere from $300-$400. Can be extended to $450 should the phone be that good. Unfortunately, current phones are not that exciting or offer high enough built-in storage with/without sdcard support. So, I plan to keep using my phone until something really good comes along. Till then, I can wait a few years.
My current phone (realme narzo 60 pro) cost $340 and has 12GB of ram and 1TB of UFS 3.1 storage. No other phone offers that in sub $400 or even $500 price range. The company that created this phone did not do this again. The realme GT 6T and GT 6 both max out at 512gb storage variants. Meaning, an upgrade would be a downgrade in storage.
Out of curiosity, why do you need so much storage on mobile? Massive music library in FLAC or something?
I am totally content with 128GB. It's enough that I'll never run out of space for my usage. (Well, aside from photos, but those get backed up in full-resolution to Amazon Photos as part of my Prime subscription).
Granted, most of my media consumption is ebooks, which are tiny.
No, not FLAC music library. I have lots of games and apps which take around 248GB. Some streaming apps like crunchyroll easily take 33GB, genshin impact 27GB, Netflix 17GB, titan quest 5.9GB, wreakfest 5.9GB, Youtube Music 5.4GB, etc.
Other data around 288GB is media like movies, serial, TVs which I downloaded for offline viewing. ROMs for gaming take around 17.7GB, 21GB is downloads including some HDR videos, LLM models, etc.
The total occupied at this point is 640GB out of 1TB.
Two phones ago in 2021 I spent ~$700 on a Samsung.
Since then, I realized I really do not care about most of the fancier things smartphones can do, and when it started having connectivity issues last year I traded it in for a Pixel 7a for about $250 after discounts and rebates.
$3-400. Upper range if I can't get anything for a trade-in, which is rare. I generally only get Pixel a-series but would definitely look at motorola again. It's what I had before a-series existed.
The last 3 phones I have had were/are budget phones. So less than $500, if not lower. Don't remember what my last couple were, but my current is a roughly $200USD Samsung.
I change phone every 5 years or so. Always pay around €600. Next time I probably will be going with something like the CMF Phone 1 or similar, it seems to have all I need for €200. Really a quality screen is all I need because everything else is very similar for regular use no matter if is high end of low end.
Once my phone breaks, I spend $150-250 on a "new" old pixel. a couple gens behind, but honestly when I get the next one, it's always basically the same, so I don't know why I'd buy new. My current 4S's battery is pretty shot, so it's about time to upgrade again, but I'll be sad to lose the tinier size and headphones jack. I never use the jack, but I like that it's there as a backup.
I used to use the jack but I'll willingly take bt and being able to wash the phone in the sink instead. now instead of microsd which nobody really does any more all they should be giving us removable backplate and nvme slot. I would tolerate a lot of bullshit for that.
I pay whatever is needed to get the features I need, within reason. My current phone was ~$500 CAD (XPeria 10 V). It was the only narrow phone with good battery life at a reasonable price with 8 GB RAM at the time.
200 up to about 450 is where I normally go. I always go for the mid-range devices though. Like I had a Moto G several times. I have the OnePlus Nord N200 right now. I've had the Pixel "A" series before. So I generally go for the mid-range devices in that 200 to 450 dollar category.
I got a Galaxy S24+ Exynos for 750 USD this year with Galaxy Buds 2 Pro bundled in. It was one heck of a deal. I've been living it. Should last me long time.
I bought a Google pixel 4a a while back for 550 Australian dollars after shopping around and price matching. Helped my partner get a Motorola G54 for $250 after price matching and it seems to have all the features that I had on my old phone that I'm pretty happy with. If I have to replace my Pixel someday I'm kinda on the fence whether I should get a Fairphone or to just go for a Motorola like hers.
Used to be max 200€, then 300€ and my last phone was 220€. But prices keep rising and next will probably be 500. I never do trade-ins though and keep using the old phones afterwards.
My last 5 phones have been out of contract, and less than $400 with trade in and/or discounts. I always stick with the pixel lineup. Frankly I don't think I'll be spending that much on this next upgrade though. the latest and greatest just doesn't make that big of a difference in my daily usage nowadays, and paying a premium for the high end stuff doesn't really get you much more than the mid range stuff.
I don't mind paying ~1300€ for a new phone, if that phone meets my need. I know it's a little bit too much according to how much would other people spend, but if I can get more stuff done with that phone, I think it's money well spent.
I had a similar approach until recently: 100€/year +100€, mostly 300-400€ phones for about 4-5 years (so not that many). But my last phone was 500€ and i doubt I'll use it for 6 years, so let's see
I generally don't spend more than I have to so I stick with mid rangers. Only time that was a bad mistake I'd say is when I bought a pos nothing phone by far the worst android device I've ever owned.
Verizon and Google keep doing these wild trade in deals. They keep giving me $600+ to trade in last year's Pixel with 3 year "financing". So $22/mo and I always have the current Pixel. I know they're screwing me, but I can't figure out how 🤷🏻
Like 4 or 5 years ago I bought a refurbished Pixel 2 XL for like $150 or $200 or something. Works great, I don't need to upgrade (although storage is a little small). The only issue is it hasn't had security updates since 2020 which is a little scary.
I generally look at what the market is doing. I care a lot more about software availability and battery than performance these days, most manufacturers have little to offer me.
Generally, the only things of interest to me are the pixels (shootout Graphene), the fairphone, and projects like the Librem 5. IMO if you want an android and care about privacy or security, the choice is kind of obvious these days.