Every once in a while you come across a phone that makes you wonder why people spend nearly
a thousand dollars on new smartphones.
With the new flagship smartphones coming out with less surprising and innovative features,
cheaper phones are here to pick up the slack, just like an orange toupe does it to Donald
Trump’s receding hairline.
Lots of people are getting excited about the cost of new models from Chinese brands, and
for a good reason: Chinese smartphones have been giving us flagship specs for budget prices.
Today we will look at 5 best smartphones that we chose according to the hardware specs,
display quality and the presence of typical modern features like USB type-C charging ports,
fingerprint sensors and fancy display camera notches that all the new high-end phones have.
A more simple sibling to Xiaomi's 2018 flagship, the Mi 8 Lite is delivering a premium design,
decent performance and some surprisingly capable cameras.
It has almost every design aspect usually associated with phones in the $500+ bracket.
If you told someone you paid twice as much for the Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite, they would likely
believe you.
It’s body is metal and there’s a display notch and slim screen borders.
Mi 8 Lite gets a very good 24 MP front-facing camera and the rest of the hardware is also
quite good for a mid-range device.The difference between its screen and the displays of some
$700 phones is not very obvious.
Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite can make content look rich and natural.
It has a Snapdragon 660 processor, an octa-core chipset with Kryo 260 cores, and an Adreno
512 GPU.
This is much more powerful than the CPUs of the Moto One, Nokia 7.1 or the Samsung Galaxy
A7.The Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite’s video is interesting, too.
It can shoot footage at up to 4K resolution (30fps) and it also has electronic image stabilisation
for 1080p and 4K capture.
And just to mention, stabilised 4K is almost unheard of at this level.
There’s no wireless charging hardware in the Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite, but it does have a USB-C
input and fast charging, which is now an important feature in making a phone seem current.
The Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite sets a very high standard for “affordable” phones.
If you have done research on affordable and fast phones, you likely came across Xiaomi’s
Popo F1.
The jewel in this phone’s crown isn’t just its low price, it’s what you get for
your money.
Not only does the Pocophone match OnePlus 6 or Honor 10, it beats phones like the Galaxy
S9 or Pixel 2.
The company’s decision to load the F1 up with Qualcomm’s fastest ever processor is
a very bold move.
By some tech wizardry they used Snapdragon 845, the same chip that powers phones costing
upwards of twice the price.
Then to shoot a final nail in the coffin of the high-priced phones Xiaomi paired it with
options for 6GB or 8GB of RAM.
Pair that with a choice of either 64GB or 128GB of storage, and you’re looking at
a proper mid-range moonshot.
You even get a 3.5mm headphone jack, which is quite refreshing, and the phone’s 4,000mAh
battery is topped up via a USB Type-C charging port on the bottom edge.
The dual-SIM slot on the left edge also allows for storage expansion up to 256GB in capacity,
and the volume button sits next to a slightly rounded rectangular power button on the right.
There’s an extended 6.18-inch Full HD+ screen that dominates the front of the F1, sporting
a 2246 x 1080 resolution.
There’s no HDR support or any such cutting-edge tech wizardry, but it’s nonetheless a display
that has no business being on a $300 phone – and yet here it is, in all its visual
delight.
A few weeks ago we have seen a review of a Umidigi F1.
F1 play is very similar, but it has some distinct differences, with notable changes in memory
and camera.
They both pack a 6.3-inch display with a waterdrop cutout, and each has a massive 5150mAh battery.
F1 Play has more RAM - 6 GB instead of 4, and a higher-Megapixel rear camera - 48 instead
of 16.
The newest Mediatek Helio P60 processor, 6GB of RAM and the Mali G72MP3 video chip, provide
an acceptable number of frames per second even in demanding applications.
The internal storage in 64GB may not be enough, but the microSD card slot is always ready
to help.
F1 Play features a gorgeous 6.3-inch FHD+ (2,340 x 1,080).
UMIDIGI includes NFC and global radio bands.
Anyone should be able to use the handset to make wireless payments and connect to a cell
tower no matter where you are in the world.
Additionally, the UMIDIGI F1 Play, which runs near stock Android with no annoying apps and
ads in the UI.
The Lenovo S5 Pro is a revamped version of its predecessor, the Lenovo S5.
It is a mid-range smartphone with dual cameras on its front and back.
Additional features of the dual cameras include optical zoom and support for artificial intelligence-powered
portrait shots for the rear cameras.
For display, the Lenovo S5 Pro features a large 6.1-inch Full HD+ display which has
a screen resolution of 1,080 x 2,246 pixels.
There is a notch on the top-center of the screen, which is the common design on recent
smartphones to maximize screen size.
Besides that, the 3,500 mAh battery of the phone carries support for 18W fast charging.
Lenovo S5 Pro offers an impressive camera and decent hardware specifications.
It is not as high-performing as the top range smartphones, but it is enough to satisfy most
users who love taking photos on smartphones and running multiple apps without issues.
Honor, which is a subdivision of Huawei, is their new brand.
It is unclear why they did that, given the fact that Huawei is already a world established
name, but nonetheless here we have it.
The Honor Play looks very similar to the Honor 10 in design, but it has a matte metal finish
backplate instead of a shiny, glossy one.
You get USB Type-C for charging and an AUX jack.
Even if you're not a gamer, this is one of the best value phones on the market, offering
flagship performance at a fraction of the price, so long as you don't mind missing out
on the best photography features.
Competitive benchmark scores, in partnership with the the Honor Play's GPU Turbo tech,
means that mobile gaming is, simply put, a no-compromise situation.
Honor Play is powered by the Kirin 970 - the same chip as the $350 Honor 10 and $500 Huawei
P20.
Designed to optimise gaming performance and frame rendering, the company claims it boosts
graphics processing efficiency by 60 percent, while simultaneously reducing power consumption
by 30 percent.
The boost should kick in on any game, but will be most noticeable on games from Huawei’s
partner developers, currently including PUBG and Asphalt 9.
Its backed up by 4GB of RAM and a slightly low 64GB of storage - though that is at least
expandable by MicroSD.
Features like its big and sharp 6.3-inch 2340x1080 screen with a 89% screen-to-body ratio, thin
and light build with a iPhone-style aesthetic, and excellent selection of camera modes and
options back this up.
If you are still looking for the higher-end phone packed with features like wireless charging
and AMOLED displays, we will see them next week.
And if you want to see other tech gadgets at bargain prices, head over to our shop section.
On the right is a playlist with our unboxings and tests where you will see a full review
of a Umidigi F1, and on the left is a video suggested to you by YouTube.
Adios!