Table of contents A few years ago, the decision to buy a budget smartphone was simple. If a phone was cheap, you already knew what you were giving up: smooth performance, durability, long-term usability, sometimes all three. Budget phones were stopgaps, not devices you expected to rely on every day. That assumption doesn’t quite hold anymore. I noticed this shift the first time I spent a full day with a Tecno Pop 10. Scrolling felt unusually smooth. The phone didn’t lag when switching betwee...