Best budget smartphones - our top cheap mobile phone choices

If you’re unlucky enough to lose your mobile phone or have it stolen, you won’t just suffer near cataclysmic inconvenience, you’ll also realise that quality smartphones are extraordinarily expensive.

My iPhone would cost more than £1,600 to replace – £400 more than the MacBook laptop that I use all day, every day, as the main tool of my trade.

Yet while I wouldn’t wave my laptop around in the street for fear of breaking it, losing it or having some little oik on a moped whizzing by and nicking it, I brandish my precious phone in public places every day.

All over the world, phone thefts are soaring in cities, holiday resorts and on public transport.

Listening to a BBCRadio 4 item on phone thefts recently, I was struck by one person who was using his cheap and unfashionable smartphone to navigate around London and had it pinched by a boy on a bike – who then threw it back as he rode off because it wasn’t a fancy make.

Why not, I thought, have a cheap and nasty smartphone for urgent texting/calls, GoogleMaps and so on while keeping your proper phone hidden? Apart from spoiling a thief’s day, which would be fun, it should protect you from any more than minimal trouble.

One option is to buy a secondhand smartphone from many high street shops, or online from Back Market. Expect to pay £100 to £200.

But I’ve been looking at brand new, laughably cheap smartphones – costing from £50 to £100 – from tiny Chinese brands with strange names, and they are, well, fine.

Yes, they’re a bit slow, plasticky and have naff screens, but they do the job adequately.

The one I bought was the PrzTlk and has a RRP of £56.99 on Amazon. I have positively enjoyed using it out and about without the remotest fear. I obviously don’t keep banking apps or any private information on it.

A step up is the Umidigi Note 100 RRP £102 (Amazon) which is a sleek beast with a serious camera, though, again, it’s not a phone that muggers will appreciate.

Almost identical is the Doogee Note 58, RRP £149.99 (Amazon), which is from a minor but recognisable – and in my experience, excellent – brand.

Finally, to my surprise, it’s possible to get a new Samsung for RRP of £109.99 (Amazon). Its A16 Dual LTE is very well regarded, the only problem being because of the name, a thief might think it’s worth more than it is.

You will need a separate SIM card and number for your street phone, but that can be bought anywhere and used for £10 or so a month.