POCO F4 5G: A Well-rounded Option at a Reasonable Price
POCO released the highly anticipated POCO F4 5G smartphone in India in June 2022. The POCO F4 5G boasts remarkable hardware, including an FHD+ 120Hz AMOLED display with Dolby Vision, a Snapdragon 870 SoC, a 64MP camera with optical image stabilization, and a 67W rapid charging. But does the phone’s price justify its features? Let’s investigate this further.
Design
It features a 4500mAh battery yet is just 7.7mm thick and weighs 195g thanks to its big screen and glass back. In addition, the phone is splash-proof up to a certain depth (IP53). Thus, it can withstand accidental spills and moderate rain but not submersion.
A tiny 2.67mm punch-hole houses the 20-megapixel camera, which is hardly noticeable while playing films on the phone. An earphone that acts as a speaker is located on the upper border of the screen. In addition to the regular array of proximity, ambient light, gyroscope, and accelerometer, the phone also has a magnetometer.
The phone’s right side is home to the volume rockers and power buttons (which also double as a fingerprint scanner). The power button also has gesture controls that let you accomplish some tasks with a double press, such as starting an app or snapping a screenshot. The bottom has two SIM card slots, a speaker grill, the main microphone, and a USB Type-C connector. Unfortunately, there is no microSD card slot available. A speaker grille, supplementary microphone, and infrared sensor may be on top.
In addition to the glossy front, the rear of the phone is finished in sleek matte glass. The phone is available in both Nebula Green and Night Black.
Display
The POCO F4 has a 6.67-inch Full HD+ AMOLED screen with a resolution of 2400 x 1080 pixels, a 20:9 aspect ratio, and around 395 PPI pixel density. The display is luminous with a usual brightness of 900 nits and a peak brightness of 1300 nits, the latter of which is activated while HDR material is being shown. In addition, having a DCI-P3 Color Gamut of 100% means that the colors are accurate and vivid.
The 120Hz refresh rate display of the phone toggles between 30Hz and 60Hz, and 120Hz, depending on the kind of media. In addition, the touch sampling rate is an impressive 360 Hz. When activated, it provides a fluid and responsive experience, particularly when navigating the user interface or playing a video game. Support includes Dolby Vision, which Netflix uses, and HDR 10+, which YouTube and Amazon Prime Video.
You may customize the colors and brightness of the screen to your liking in the display settings menu. Reading mode dims the screen to prevent eye strain while you’re doing late-night reading; however, this feature gets deactivated when you play HDR movies. There’s a nighttime mode that’s much like the ones on other MIUI phones. There’s an option to switch to dark mode for all installed applications, albeit it doesn’t look great in practice. There’s also AI-enhanced HDR video playback and MEMC for lag-free viewing. DC dimming is not an available feature. Corning Gorilla Glass 5, the latest generation, protects the phone’s display.
Camera
The camera interface is the same as on other MIUI 12 devices from Xiaomi and POCO. All of the settings (Pro, Night, 64MP, Short Video, Panorama, VLOG, Slow Motion, Time Lapse, AI Watermark, Dual Video, Long Exposure) are at your disposal. And White balance, focus, shutter speed, ISO, and the ability to switch between the standard, wide-angle, and macro lenses are all accessible in “Pro” mode. In addition, focus peaking, exposure verification, and further customizations are all accessible in Pro mode RAW shooting. In order to facilitate the use of ported Google Camera APKs for more extensive editing and capture in RAW format, POCO has enabled Cam2API by default.
In terms of overall picture quality, images taken during the daytime had a satisfyingly wide dynamic range. With pixel binning technology, the resolution of the primary camera is increased to 16 megapixels. As a result, high dynamic range (HDR) photographs benefit from increased contrast. Although the 2MP macro camera is OK, the 8MP wide-angle camera is excellent. Thus, use the 2X zoom setting whenever possible. The 20-megapixel front-facing camera takes high-quality photos and produces full-resolution images. The primary camera does well in low light, but ultra-wide photos are only OK.
It records movies in 4k quality at 60 fps, 1080p at up to 120 fps, and 720p at up to 240 fps, respectively. There’s also a 960fps mode that has to be converted. Additionally, both the ultra-wide (at 1080/30 fps) and macro (at 720p) cameras can record video in full high definition. The primary camera’s OIS works as advertised, and there’s also an ultra-steady option that employs both OIS and EIS—but at the cost of dropping down to 1080p.
Software
The device comes with Android 12 and MIUI 13 as its operating system. POCO has not confirmed the number of software upgrades for the phone, but we may anticipate at least two major ones for the Android operating system. Several pre-installed MIUI 13 applications are now removable. Features like Gesture shortcuts, one-handed mode, Quick Ball, and more are all included. It comes with POCO launcher 2.2 preinstalled, and the manufacturer has promised a more feature-rich POCO launcher 4.0 upgrade in the near future.
Battery
Although the phone’s built-in battery only has 4500mAh (normal), it can power the device through a whole day of intense 4G usage. You should expect it to last for around 48 hours if you just use Wi-Fi occasionally.
Performance
The Qualcomm Kryo 585 CPUs included in the Snapdragon 870 6nm Mobile Platform runs the phone. There are 1 x 3.2 GHz Kryo 585 Prime CPU (A77 based), 3 x 2.42 GHz Kryo 585 Performance CPUs (A77 based), and 4 x 1.80 GHz Kryo 585 Efficiency CPUs (A55 based).
Even in graphically heavy games, the Adreno 650 GPU ensures a fluid performance, and the phone doesn’t overheat even when used for extended periods of time.
Conclusion
The POCO F4 5G is an affordable smartphone with excellent multimedia and gaming capabilities, starting at Rs. 27,999. The back camera is well-suited for outdoor use and has optical image stabilization; the HDR screen is Dolby Atmos-compatible; and the phone’s other features, including NFC, Dolby Atmos compatibility, and more, are all present and accounted for. A lengthy wait is over: POCO’s king of value has returned!
Read more;Poco M4 Pro 5G
