Gionee A1 review: One of the best selfie camera phones out there
Gionee had recently launched its new smartphone called the “A1” in an event held in New Delhi. Initially announced at the Mobile World Congress 2017 and the company finally dropped the cover on the device a week back. The device is available on sale via Amazon India as well as various offline stores pan India. We have had the phone for some time to play with and here is our take on the Gionee A1.
Design and build quality
One of the first impressions we had when we got the device was that it looked like the OnePlus 3/3T from the front. Not blaming anyone but the smartphone design has been seeing a flatline on the innovation curve for the past few years, and it is the same with the Gionee A1. On the plus side, because the design was so similar to the OnePlus and iPhone 7 that we did not need any time getting used to the design format of the A1.
The feel of the A1 is where we saw that Gionee had actually made an effort to build a phone which did not give the impression of falling apart if handled lightly. The A1 has a brushed aluminium casing at the back with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 at the front. The display has a 2.5D curved glass housing (again strikingly similar to the OP and i7) with curved edges and a power button and volume rockers on the right.
The speaker grille is placed at the bottom with the charging port placed in the middle. However the placement is an issue during playing games in landscape mode.
The form factor is big but this did not see us struggle to reach the power button or the volume rocker keys. We were comfortable with this device, even with the fingerprint scanner at the front which also doubled up as the home button. The front also houses the sensors and the much discussed selfie camera at the front. All in all, we were absolutely not disappointed with the design and build quality.
Display
Gionee placed a 5.5-inch full HD IPS LCD display with a pixel density of 401 ppi (similar to the OP3T and more than i7 which has 326 ppi) with a resolution of 1920x1080 pixels. The display feels clear and bright with great viewing angles and a decent ambient light sensor which does its job.
The colours on the screen are vivid and the 5.5-inch display makes it an ideal choice for watching movies.
User interface and performance
The A1 comes with a 2.0GHz Octa-Core MediaTek MT6755 Helio P10 processor along with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage which is expandable up to 256GB via microSD. The user interface is smooth and does not lag even while navigating or doing multi-tasking. The A1 runs on Android 7.0 Nougat with the Amigo OS 4.0 on top. There are multiple customization options available inside the UI which ranges from split-screen multi tasking to different native Android customisations.
We played a number of heavy games like Real Racing 3, Nova 3, Asphalt 8 and the device handled the games quite well. One notable issue we faced was the overheating while long gaming sessions.
Camera
Looking through various other reviews, we found the Gionee A1 shining in the camera department. When we got the device, we found the camera as good as described and could be said as one of the best features of this smartphone. The front camera is a 16-megapixel unit with an LED flash. The front and the back camera are both equipped with a number of modes that you can choose from such as beautification, panorama view, and Night mode.
The performance was also decent with the primary camera which is a 13-megapixel unit and a sensor size of 1/3” and has touch-focus, face detection, HDR, and can record videos at 1080p @ 30fps. The pictures in the daylight were decent enough, although we did see some inconsistency.
Battery
The battery on the A1 has a capacity of 4010mAh which easily lasted us a day and a half depending on the kind of usage we had. Also, the company provides a fast charger, even though we saw the battery charge from near-zero to full in about two hours which is not exactly fast.
Verdict
The phone looks premium, feels premium, and is quick without any lags. The A1 has the good specifications to boast with a huge battery to support it. However the pricing is at Rs 19,999 which places it in the sub-flagship segment. However, the phone’s price is not justified mainly because the phone is good for selfies and basic daily usage.
There are a few minor glitches in the phone which could easily be removed with an OTA update. Overall, the phone is a decent one with good specs but not the best.
