For a month and a half now, the Tecno Phantom X, or Phantom X, if the branding at the launch event at the start of July is anything to go by, has been my trusted companion. What others would call a “daily driver”.
This is perhaps the longest I have ever taken to use and test a Tecno smartphone before penning its review. There is a good reason why. Reasons, actually.
First of all, it’s a very good device, overall. Impressive is the word I’d use to describe it over and over again.
Secondly, everything just happens to fall into place nicely when it comes to the Phantom X, as you will see in the course of this review.
Design and display
The Phantom X is very well designed. It has the waterfall (curved) display that one has probably seen on devices from other brands. Well, Tecno is part of the party, too. The way the display curves and almost wraps around the entire device is reminiscent of the Samsung Galaxy S8+ I spent quite some time with back in 2017.
Match this curved display with some software customizations like the notification light on the sides (since the Phantom X does not have a notification LED – when was the last time you saw one?) and you have yourself a device that anyone would want to touch when you place it on a table.
Placing it on a table won’t elicit any wobbling from the device despite the protruding hub that houses the device’s tri-camera arrangement and quad flash. If anything, it is at home on a flat surface when naked just as it is when the very nice-looking and snuggly-fitting back cover is applied. The Oraimo back cover is such a nice touch – has a premium soft touch and feel – I had it on the entire time.
It hides from view a rather nice-looking back that isn’t a fingerprint magnet but which you don’t want risking getting dirty.
My favourite bit about the Phantom X’s design is the reduction of the bezels to… Almost nothing? The top and the chin are margins you can live with. Being a curved display design, there are no side bezels to speak of.
While we’ll be getting to the software in a bit, I was impressed that, somehow, Tecno managed to exorcise the ghost of accidental touches on the curved sides of the display. That’s not a problem you are going to experience and, if you are not a fan of curved displays, you can continue using the Phantom X as if it didn’t exist.
There’s also the high refresh rate (90Hz) but is that worth talking about on such a premium device when Tecno and sister brand Infinix are bringing it to their entire smartphone portfolio? A head turner would’ve been the inclusion of a 120Hz panel but hey, there’s always a next time. The Phantom X is the first in what, we hope, is a long line of future the “flagship sub-brand” devices. There’s room for more improvements and a wow factor.
Cameras
The cameras are every bit impressive. Both during the day and at night. Using the front and the back sensors.
Here are lots of samples:
There are obviously some things it could get better like the dynamic range in some cases, as you can see from the snaps above. The lack of image stabilization and a slow shutter show their ugly face when you take some photos and, from a distance, it looks like there’s some phantom in the background, creating some sort of parallax effect (see below).
The night shots are my absolute favourites. As you can see from the above photos, we really can’t argue with that, can we?
They’re even better when night mode kicks in.
Audio in recorded videos, something we almost never dwell on in our reviews because of how terrible it tends to be, is, surprisingly, so good.
Software
As usual, the Phantom X is powered by Tecno’s HiOS. Version 7.6 in this case, based on Android 11. Nothing that we haven’t seen before.
As such, it keeps the same advantages of the customizations that Android device makers make to the core operating system and the disadvantages that go with going overboard as Tecno and its sister brands often do.
My number one pet peeve has been the annoying pop up from the Phoenix app which is now more than just the browser we knew it as. Phoenix has morphed to become a multipurpose application that also steps in to help you view PDFs on your phone without having to install any other third-party application or using the Google-offered option tied to its Drive service.
And therein lies the problem. Not only will Phoenix be the default suggestion, meaning that most users of the device who aren’t savvy enough to know there are options out there will go for it (or just about anyone since using a smartphone should be easy and not something you have to scratch your head about), it will also take forever to open the intended document (I never had any success in my case) and also keep pestering you every other time.
My other pet peeve? Something that I have highlighted here on Android Kenya before, when reviewing the Infinix Note 10 Pro: the software customizations don’t play nicely with other services that require apps to not be forcefully entered into deep sleep mode as part of the system’s battery management processes. No amount of whitelisting and whatnot works and one has to simply remember to start any of the third-party apps they need to use on Android Auto before embarking on their trip.
It takes a while to have that in one’s muscle memory (I, for one, never got around to having it) since one mostly figures out that they need to listen to their fire Apple Music playlist when they’re already on the move and the whole point of systems like Android Auto is to make it safe to access one’s phone and phone functions while on the go without having to physically hold the phone, which is dangerous.
Not all is doom and gloom, though. I found Ella, Tecno’s new voice assistant, a breath of fresh air. Is Ella necessary? Not really. She’s redundant in the face of the Google Assistant but hey, nice try, Tecno. She mostly stays out of the way and, unless you set a trigger key in the settings, you might not even realize that she’s always there, at your beck and call.
Performance
Any misgivings I have had with the software on the Phantom X evaporate when it comes to the performance. Sure, I may not like the way things are handled by the software but that doesn’t mean that the software is overbearing on the device. Those are simply preferences and, what I consider to be a good user experience design.
Tecno has gone above and beyond to ensure that the performance of the Tecno Phantom X is first-rate.
The Helio G95 chipset from MediaTek has seen better days but it is still no slouch and, paired with a sufficient 8 gigabytes of memory, holds up just fine.
The fineness extends to the endurance bit where the battery holds up well for, at most a day and a half, at least in my usage. I was able to squeeze just over 7 hours of screen on time with the display set at the highest refresh rate and with normal device usage – calls, social media etc. Your mileage should vary if you’re to stretch the device with gaming or lots and lots of calls and tethering as I quickly noticed.
The lowdown
The thing that has caught the attention of most people regarding the Phantom X is its price: Kshs 50,000.
Is the device worth that much?
From my quick look at the device above, that is arguable.
There are two ways to look at it: as an out and out smartphone that Tecno has released into the market like it does any other smartphones.
Or, as we explained in our podcast (listen to it, please), as the first device in Tecno’s new venture that has seen it spin off its flagship smartphone series into its own sub-brand. What this means is that, future Phantom smartphones – and any other devices that may be offered under the name – won’t be just the peak of Tecno’s smartphone offerings: they’ll be their own phones altogether. These are the devices that Tecno plans to use to generate some appeal and attention to its brand in new markets. Especially those it has not had a presence in. Like Europe, for instance, which has become a good playground for budget phone brands branching out of Asia and most of the developing world.
That said, at the end of the day, when you walk into a shop’s display area to play around with the Phantom X with the hopes of either picking one for yourself or settling on something else they offer, what is at the back of your head is the steep Kshs 50,000 asking price. There’s no way to go around that: the Phantom X is quite dear. It might be a good idea to hold on and wait for the price to drop in coming days since that price is a barrier for many and it’s hard to justify.
Is it a good smartphone that you should get if you have the means or opportunity? Hell yes! It’s the most impressive Tecno smartphone I have ever used. That I stuck with it for nearly two months and only gave it away after the owners continuously kept asking for it is enough proof, if you trust my judgement on matters devices.
