The phone was announced on 2 September 2020 during Samsung's virtual "Life Unstoppable" event, and first released on 11 November 2020 as a successor to the Galaxy A41.

It was rebranded as the 'Samsung Galaxy M42 5G' in India and launched in the M series lineup on 1 May 2021.

[5] The Galaxy A42 5G is equipped with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 750G chipset.

Like its predecessor, there is an in-display optical fingerprint scanner.

The front-facing camera uses a 20 MP sensor, and is located in a U-shaped screen cutout.