ZTE Axon 30 Ultra review By Phandroid

Hey, what's going on guys, I'm nick gray- and this here is the brand-new axon 30 ultra from ZTE. Now with so many smartphones that are offering similar specifications and design features these days, it's becoming harder and harder to make the right decision when buying a new device, that's not to say that we're getting inundated with smartphones that really aren't worth buying. But if you're anything like me, you never really want to make the wrong choice when buying something new, especially a flagship to your device that you're going to be holding on to for one to three years, and especially now that flagship smartphones cost upwards of a thousand dollars. The new at axon 30 ultra is definitely not the best option out there. Let's get that make that clear, but it's certainly far from being the worst. I have to say after using this phone for more than two weeks now and even taking it as my only device on a week-long vacation, I'm pretty impressed with what this phone has to offer, but before we get into the full review, I'd like to thank raid shadow legends, the sponsor of this video.

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All of these bonuses can be claimed by new players by going to the treasure chest on the main screen in the game and now back to the ZTE axon 30 ultra the thing that most people point out when seeing this phone for the first time is its design similarities with Samsung's Galaxy Note 20 ultra from last year. Oh, and let's not forget the similarities with the name as well. The good news is that ZTE really isn't competing with the note with this device based off of its 750 price tag. The accent 30 ultra is more of an alternative to the Samsung Galaxy s21 or the OnePlus 9. An alternative that you actually should be paying attention to.

The basics are pretty simple: you get gorilla glass on the front and back a 6.77 inch, full HD plus display with 144hz refresh rate a snapdragon, 888 processor storage options ranging between 128 and 256 gigabytes, which are respectively paired with either 8 or 12 gigabytes of ram a 4 600 William hour battery on the inside 16 megapixel selfie camera and an advanced quad camera system on the back with three 64 megapixel main sensors for the main ultra-wide and 2x zoom cameras and then finally, an 8 megapixel, 5x, periscope zoom lens. Now, typically, when you add up all of those features, you end up with a phone that costs anywhere between 900 and 1300 dollars. But ZTE did make a few cuts to keep the price point in check. For starters, the accent 30 ultra doesn't have an official IP dust or water resistance rating. So make sure you don't take this to the pool with you, and they also decided to forgo wireless charging on the inside, something that we typically have been seeing in a lot of devices at around the 700 price range these days having to make the right compromises on certain hardware features in order to include others to hit a specific price point is always hard, but at the end of the day, it comes down to personal preference and for me not having wireless charging or an IP rating.

That's something I can definitely live with. The question is, though, is the software on this phone and the hardware performance truly enough to make it a true competitor to the other devices that are within the category? So let's start things off with the software on this device. Back when I reviewed the axon 10 about a year and a half ago now, I was thoroughly impressed with how stripped back the software experience was on that device. That's certainly not the case with this phone. This time around they've jumped off of the near stock software bandwagon and joined up with nearly every other OEM who wants to put their personal touch on top of android.

The good news is that the skin OS running on top of android 11, isn't too heavy simply skinning everything within the android UI elements, rather than changing them completely. That being said, the quick setting toggles seem to be a little out of place with four extra large buttons at the very top, while this design choice is a little unusual. Having those larger targets is quite helpful for turning on and off Wi-Fi or Bluetooth multiple times per day, something that I typically do, but it would have been nice if at allowed those larger buttons to be customized. I was also pleasantly surprised to see that android 12 will be adopting a very similar design choice with quick toggle settings. With the new look introduced at Google, I o a few weeks back.

It's as if at had an early look at android 12 and decided to incorporate those new design elements just a little. Early ZTE also gets a little of credit for not using excessive bloatware on this device, something that's becoming quite prevalent on a few other Chinese brands this year. Other than that, I really have no complaints on the software front. It's clean fast and doesn't get in the way of the apps that you want to use like so many other smartphones running the snapdragon 888 chipsets. This phone can put up some pretty impressive numbers, while benchmarking and also offers a perfect experience in everyday use, while posting updates to social media scrolling through your Instagram feed or really just trying to get work done and multitasking, it's also pretty good when it comes to gaming, but the top edge of the phone and the area around the camera module on the back does have a tendency to get quite hot.

During longer gaming sessions. Out of curiosity, I ran 3dmark's wildlife stress test benchmark to see how significant the performance degradation was after the benchmark loops 20 times after the app force closed three times on the 15th 18th and 16th loop. The fourth attempt finally completed with a 54.3 performance stability after the 20th loop. Now, that's the lowest number that I've ever seen from a smartphone running a snapdragon 888, but it's definitely not far off the mark with most devices running that same chipset, typically ranging between 55 and 61. While gaming, I haven't experienced any real issues.

Besides the phone getting very hot during longer gaming sessions of Call of Duty, mobile or gentian impact, and the heat increase is honestly barely noticeable when playing less graphically intense games. I just wouldn't recommend the at xm30 ultra to anyone who's looking for a great budget-friendly gaming device, since this is a budget-friendly flagship smartphone. The full HD plus resolution of the 6.77 inch AMOLED display is to be expected, but at did throw in a 144hz refresh rate panel with 300hz touch sampling. Two features that gamers will truly love. It's just too bad that the phone's thermals negate the benefits of the display's high refresh rate while gaming.

That being said, the display on this phone is really quite nice, offering great viewing angles: amazing, colors and enough brightness to be used in direct sunlight quite comfortably. I might say the only real complaint that I have is with its curved edges, as I pointed out before on other devices, while the curved edges might add a little of flare to the phone's design, they add unnecessarily glare and make it a little harder to type than if you're typing, on a flat display. I have to admit that I really wasn't expecting much out of the cameras on this phone. With the high resolution, sensors and periscope zoom cameras delivering less than stellar results on some other devices. I was expecting more of the same, but boy was I wrong to put things into context, though the at axon 30 ultra isn't going to be winning any awards for having the best smartphone camera of this year.

But the results that you get out of this device are definitely not what you would expect out of a 750 smartphone, especially from a brand like ZTE. First off: let's talk about the 8 megapixel periscope camera on the back of the phone. To my knowledge, this is the cheapest smartphone to market the feature, one giving you incredible versatility for taking photos and videos. Now the 8 megapixel resolution of the sensor that they're using is a little low for my taste, but the results are still fairly good. You also only get 1080p video capture from the sensor.

Again, that's not a dealbreaker, just something to be aware of. As for the three 64 megapixel sensors that are on the back as well, I've come away fairly impressed, and I used it as my only device for capturing photos and videos on our week-long vacation. We took with our family I'd say that the results slot in quite nicely between the OnePlus 9 and the Samsung Galaxy s21. I honestly only have two real complaints about the overall camera system on this phone, the first one being that the portrait mode really doesn't work that well when trying to capture images of objects instead of people. And the second is that the 16 megapixel selfie camera could benefit from better dynamic range to help keep the highlights in check.

If you're looking to capture video with this phone, you can go all the way up to 8k at 30 frames per second. But honestly, the better results are going to be when you switch things over to 4k at 60 frames per second, with results being perfect in daylight situations and even low light conditions when capturing video at nighttime, with this 4 600 William hour battery, this phone will give you a long 14-hour days with roughly five and a half hours of screen on time and still leave you with roughly 10 charge at the end of the night when you plug it in, I was hoping for a little more, but the phone's excessive heat that we talked about earlier is probably one of the contributing factors as to why this doesn't last quite as long as it should. That being said, though, ZTE did include a 65 watt, fast charger in the box that allowed this phone to go from zero to a hundred percent in less than an hour. So after all of that is the at accent, 30 ultra the right phone for you. Well, that's a decision.

You're going to have to make on your own, but I will say that, if you're simply looking for a well-rounded device at a great price, the 750 dollar price tag of this phone is definitely worth it. In my books, the only real issue that I do have is with the phone's thermals, but unless you're a hardcore mobile gamer that really shouldn't be too much of an issue for you and that's going to do it for this review. Let me know what your thoughts are on this device in the comments below. Thank you guys so much for watching, and I'll catch you in the next one. You.

Source : Phandroid