Do you remember the time when we enjoyed the most out of our Nokia 3310 units? We were so amazed by that handset that every “cellphone” store in the malls has the accessory for it. That was the craze that everybody remembers when we utter the word “Nokia.”
HMD Global, the company responsible for reviving the good old mobile company, has brought the Nokia 8 ? the flagship smartphone for a returning series.
Design
Nokia has a different choice for the Nokia 8’s size with 5.3-inch display, the sum average of iPhone’s 4.7 inches and the brewing benchmark of 5.5 inches. The company was able to shrink the display size despite having a huge set of internal engine, making the Nokia 8 as one of the most pocket-friendly smartphones around.
The right edge mounts the volume keys and the power/lock key, while the left side houses the SIM and microSD hybrid tray. For your audio output, the 3.5mm sits at the top of Nokia 8, while a USB Type-C port stays at the bottom. Nokia 8 removes the navigation bar, placing it on screen with the fingerprint sensor working as a home button at the same time.
Backing up Nokia’s flagship handset is a beautiful view of its dual-camera setup. It is powered by Zeiss, which is responsible for bringing a 13-megapixel f/2.0 armor to this line. At the front is another 13-megapixel front camera.
Nokia 8’s overall design has climbed up to our top choices for smartphones as this device exhibits sharpness and sides on the classy corner. However, its back cover’s material made it slippery that it should have included a jelly case to protect the unit and ease the slippery hump.
Performance
Who wouldn’t love a QHD or WQHD screen resolution in a smartphone? The Nokia 8 pulled off a 1440 x 2560 resolution on a 5.3-inch screen, making it the sharpest screen we’ve ever seen.
It runs an Android 7.1.1 Nougat and is ready to upgrade to Android 8.0 Oreo once it arrives. You may notice how Nokia 8 has prepared itself to Google’s upcoming operating systems, and that’s because the newest Nokia line is trying to integrate pure Android skin to its core.
Given the software details, let us give you the hardware specifications using our Antutu? benchmark:
We got the 64GB-4GB (internal memory-RAM) version of Nokia 8 and what’s more impressive is that it has a 128GB-6GB version lying around. The former seems to be an overkill for its price point, but it definitely contends against the flagships of other brands. If you’re choosing the latter, you may ditch the extra socket eaten by the microSD slot and install an extra SIM card instead.
Before we dig into Nokia 8’s amazing benchmark scores, we’d like to mention first that its battery is enough to last for a day, but unfortunately misses the quick-charging feature that we wish to have.
Going back to benchmark scores, see how Nokia 8 killed it:
By looking at it, Nokia 8 placed itself on the best smartphones around.
Camera
As we mentioned above, the Nokia 8 boasts a Carl Zeiss shooter that gives out excellent imaging for a front and rear camera. However, this shooter is equipped with f/2.0, which is .02 and 0.3 shy away from the standard f/1.7 and f/1.8. It prevents the Nokia 8 to shoot photos and videos without grains in the dark. Nevertheless, this smartphone captures better details when lit properly as shown in the photos below:
The first photo is the closest crop we did to the third photo ? the widest. As you can see, cropping down to the very detail did not stop the Nokia 8 from producing sharp and vivid tone images.
Conclusion
Priced at P29,990, the Nokia 8 is undoubtedly a steal when rubbed against other brands’ 50,000-peso flagships that house the same specs ? or even shorter. The 128GB-6GB, however, will only be available in Europe, therefore we’re stuck with just one option, which is the 64GB-4GB edition.
The Good
- Handy and feels good to the hands
- Crisp sharp display
- Pure Android skin
The Bad
- No quick-charging feature
- Slippery