“The Vivo U10 is a budget offering from the brand that retails exclusively on the e-commerce platform Amazon”
Vivo, which made inroads to the Indian smartphone market via the offline route, has recently started venturing into the online channel. At an event in New Delhi today, the Chinese phonemaker has launched the Vivo U10, an all-new series in the budget category, which comes soon after the launch of the online-centric Vivo Z1 Pro and Z1x smartphones. The handset arrived at our premises recently and here’s how I feel about the Vivo U10 based on a short stint with it.
Starting with the unboxing of the Vivo U10, it comes in a minimal-looking rectangular white box. Inside the box, you’ll find cardboard that holds a transparent case for the U10, a sim-ejector tool, and some documentation. Underneath that, the handset is there lying face up, and there are 18W wall adapter and a micro-USB cable for charging. Sadly, Vivo doesn’t bundle earphones with Vivo U10 smartphone.
The Vivo U10 takes its design cues from the Vivo Y17 (first impressions), which was launched back in June. The handset has the same Halo-notch display, polycarbonate body, triple rear cameras with gold trim, a squircle fingerprint scanner, and Vivo branding. The right spine of the phone has got volume and power buttons, while the left spine holds a sim-ejector tray, which also has a dedicated slot for microSD card (to expand storage up to 256GB). You won’t find anything at the top edge as speaker grill, micro USB charging port, microphone, and 3.5mm audio socket are all placed at the bottom of the Vivo U10.
Overall, the Vivo U10 looks quite premium, but there’s no denying that the phone is slippery and prone to fingerprints and smudges. Also, the display isn’t tapered towards the edges – it’s slightly raised by a fraction of a millimetre – which ruins the symmetrical design of the handset. But, if you’re past that, the U10 ranks among the better-looking devices in the price segment.
Vivo’s U10 ships with a 6.35-inch LCD screen that bears HD+ resolution, 19.5:9 aspect ratio, and a small cut-out up top that houses the selfie camera. The phone has minimal bezels except for the chin which is slightly thicker. Now, for its asking price, the display of the Vivo U10 is more than satisfactory. The colour reproduction, text, and brightness are all quite good.
Under the hood, the Vivo U10 is powered by the Snapdragon 665 chipset, which is a successor to the Snapdragon 660 SoC. The octa-core chipset is clocked at 2.0GHz and paired with 4GB RAM + 64GB storage variant (there is 3GB RAM + 32GB storage model of the phone as well). During our time with the phone, there weren’t any hiccups or lag while opening apps or switching between them. That said, it remains to be seen how the device performs under pressure while running graphics-intensive games or heavy apps. The fingerprint scanner also works as advertised, though you can also enable face unlock. The Vivo U10 boots Android 10-based FunTouchOS out of the box and houses a 5,000mAh battery with 18W fast charging support.
As far as the camera goes, the Vivo U10 has four in total – three at the back and one on the front. An 8-megapixel shooter with an f/2.2 aperture lens can be found inside the waterdrop notch for capturing selfies. The phone clicks respectable selfies in decent lighting conditions but struggles in the low light environment. Also, the camera is a little slow to focus, but on the bright side, supports HDR to further improve the results.
The rear cameras, which comprises a 13-megapixel f/2.2 lens + 8-megapixel ultra-wide lens + 2-megapixel depth sensor, are good – not excellent – for the most part. The cameras are backed by Vivo’s AI algorithm, filters, AI Beauty mode, Panorama, and Pro mode. Furthermore, the phone is capable of recording videos of 30fps with full-HD resolution. You’ll have to wait for the Vivo U10 review to know our verdict on the cameras.
The Vivo U1 price in India starts at Rs 8,990 for the 3GB RAM + 32GB storage option, while the 3GB + 64GB variant will set you back by Rs 9,990. The top-end 4GB RAM + 64GB storage variant costs Rs 10,990. The handset will be up against the likes of Realme 5 (review) and Redmi Note 7S smartphones, which have been the popular choice in the price segment – especially for the online buyers.
Photos by Raj Rout
