Introduction
Latest in the offering from Vivo, the Vivo Z1X is the sibling to Vivo Z1 family and brings 48MP onboard which is a major improvement over the 16MP sensor on Z1 Pro. The phone is a perfect amalgamation of some of the best from Vivo Z1 Pro that the Chinese manufacturer enhanced further to bring Vivo Z1X into existence. With a price tag of Rs 14,990/- (base variant), does the phone got it all to justify its price? Is it worth a buy? I got my hands on Vivo Z1X for a couple of days. I used the phone and tested every aspect. Here’s everything you need to know about Vivo Z1X that’ll help you decide whether you should go for it or not.
Read also: Oppo F1 Review
Prices in India, Variants, Availability
The Vivo Z1X arrives in four distinct storage trends and two colour variants. The device is available in Fusion Blue and Phantom Purple that incur no price change when it comes to choosing your favourite colour with any storage variant. Moving on the pricing, the Vivo Z1X 6GB+64GB is available at Rs 15,990/-, the 4GB+128GB variant carries a price tag of Rs 14,990/-, the larger 6GB+128GB is available at Rs 16,990/- and finally, the largest 8GB+128GB variant has a price of Rs 17,990/- on Vivo India website and Flipkart excluding any deals & discounts on it.
Here, both Vivo & Flipkart are offering Exchange Offer where the discounted amount changes a bit based on the phone you want to exchange with the max cap of Rs 14,000/- on the latter. There’s a 5% off on Axis Bank Buzz Credit Card & Flipkart Axis Bank Credit Card as well and finally, there’s No cost EMI to go with where you can purchase the phone in EMI without paying any interest on it with selected banks.
Box Contents
Talking about the contents in the retail box, Vivo Z1X arrives in a decently packaged box. The contents include a TPU case, a pre-applied protective film on the handset itself, quick start manual, a USB Type-C Cable, a power adapter, a SIM ejector tool, and earphones.
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Specs at a Glance
Vivo Z1X arrives with an octa-core Snapdragon 712 chipset onboard manufactured on a 10nm node. The chipset includes two 2.3GHz Kryo 360 Gold high-performance cores and six 1.7GHz Kryo 360 Silver power-efficient cores onboard along with Adreno 616 GOU to process graphics on this phone. The device is equipped with 64/128GB of storage and 4/6/8GB of RAM options available at your disposal. The device uses UFS 2.1 storage system which is not as quick as UFS 3.0 but that justifies the price tag it falls in so yes, it is a great feature to have.
Design and Build Quality
Vivo Z1X is an unapologetically glossy and flashy variant that offers a majestic switch in the design. Instead of sticking to common gradient back panel design that has become mainstream, Vivo Z1X uses a gaudier colour scheme which alternates with varying shades of the same colour. This is different from what Vivo Z1 Pro managed to pull off with its dual-tone gradient design and it now looks pretty premium. The back panel is made up of polycarbonate. The rear panel is glossy for sure and slippery.
The phone weighs at 189.6 grams which is although lighter than Vivo Z1 Pro or Oppo A9 2020 but it is bulky. The phone is too tall and it is sort of uneasy to reach the topmost buttons on the sides of the top section of the screen without adjusting and stretching fingers trying to tap on the upper section. I found the device a bit difficult to use with one hand, although it depends on the size of the hands you have as well.
The rear panel has Vivo Z1X’s triple camera setup arranged in a camera bump on the left side of the panel along with Vivo branding and that’s all. The camera bump has a slide bumped up the rim to prevent the glass from scratching and ruining the overall camera experience on the phone. At the front, you will see a decent and minimal waterdrop-shaped notch with relatively thinner bezels and chin and has Schott Xensation 3D glass protection at the front which is a Corning Gorilla Glass alternative. Next up, the right side has power buttons and volume rockers, the left side as a dedicated Google Assistant button and a SIM Card tray to pull-off followed by a USB Type-C port, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a noise-cancelling microphone at the bottom.
The SIM card tray is a dual card slot that will hold two nano-sized SIM cards. There’s no microSD card slot neither dedicated nor hybrid onboard. Overall, the phone does have a good build quality with a flat form factor at the back that instils confidence in the users as well as the look is more understandable and subtle rather than clinging to a glamorous design smartphone.
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Display
If you want to know the specifications of the display mounted on Vivo Z1X has, it is a 6.38-inch Super AMOLED panel with a resolution of 1080×2340 pixels and 404PPI. It has a 19.5:9 aspect ratio and thanks to the sAMOLED panel, the phone also has Always-On feature as well.
So I tried and tested the phone and to be honest, the display looks refined and a major improvement over LCD panel that Vivo Z1 Pro arrived with. The Super AMOLED panel tends to produce darker blacks and brighter whites. It also has a good viewing angle and I didn’t see any distortion even after I used it at an angle.
The display is vibrant and adds to the excellent battery life the phone can provide with a relatively smaller battery life which wouldn’t have been possible otherwise with an LCD panel. The colour temperature is cool by default but Vivo Z1X offers customizations to the colour temperatures as well. Overall, the display has a very good brightness onboard which is great for viewing it during a sunny day although the reflectivity of the display which could hamper your viewing experience in bright day time. However, you wouldn’t necessarily suffer from a washed display even at high brightness.
This makes the device a must-have companion for binge-watching movies. The display also has an anti-flickering mode that takes away the excess strain that flickering displays put on eyes. There are other features on board when it comes to protecting the eyes from excessive brightness such as eye protection and auto-brightness.
The smartphone industry is cluttered with options to choose from. No matter what price segment you are interested in, there are almost dozens of options that you can choose from which is why Vivo Z1X requires to make a place for itself if it wants to stand out. It turns out, among the competitors Realme X, Redmi Note 7 Pro, Motorola One Vision, and others, Vivo Z1X does have a place of itself.
The phone sports an unapologetically brilliant gradient design, to be honest, and has a vibrant and flashy sAMOLED panel which is a major improvement over Vivo Z1 Pro. Furthermore, the device brings a 48MP sensor onboard which is also a first for Vivo’s Z-series. The camera is something I would recommend a must-try if you are checking out Vivo Z1X at any retail store.
Battery life is something I will surely flaunt if I am using Vivo Z1X as my daily driver. But there are a few shortcomings that the phone attract which are common for any smartphone irrespective of its budget or a premium flagship phone and could be different. For Vivo Z1X, its user interface is something that irks me although it is full of customisations, it is still heavy and wouldn’t appeal to someone who likes a near-stock Android experience.
