The iQOO Z11 Lite is now available to purchase in India. It’s a new budget smartphone starting at Rs 19,499 for the base variant. The iQOO Z11 Lite offers a balanced set of hardware with a 6,500mAh battery, a 50MP primary camera, and the MediaTek Dimensity 6300 chipset. We’ve reviewed the smartphone in detail, and with the sale now live in India, here’s a detailed look at the reasons to buy or skip the iQOO Z11 Lite.
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Reasons to buy the iQOO Z11 Lite
Impressive battery life
The iQOO Z11 Lite has a sizeable 6,500mAh battery, which is more than enough for regular users and can even impress power users. The handset can last an entire day and more with activities like browsing social media, casual gaming, multi-tasking, and such. If you’re a power user, the phone should still be able to pull through one day on a full charge.
Its PCMark benchmark score is impressive and even matches rivals like Realme P4R, which has an 8,000mAh battery. The iQOO Z11 Lite’s battery drop after streaming YouTube for 60 minutes is also much better than phones with bigger batteries. The handset also holds up pretty well after playing popular titles like BGMI and COD Mobile.
Useful AI features
The iQOO Z11 Lite launches with the Android 16-based OriginOS 6 update. With this, users get a customisable software experience and lots of features. The handset also gets a decent software update policy of two Android OS upgrades and four years of security patches. With the Z11 Lite, iQOO has also added some useful AI features. The highlight is AI Creation, which essentially uses AI to summarise lengthy documents, rewrite text, expand notes, translate content, correct grammar, or even draft emails based on prompts. Since this is a built-in feature, it’s more convenient than having to use a third-party app. This feature should help students and working professionals alike.
There are more features like AI Captions, which provide live transcription, translation, and one-tap summaries, and AI Transcript Assist converts recordings into text with summaries and highlights. Such AI features, especially on a budget phone does make the Z11 Lite stand out among the crowd.
Good thermals during gaming
The iQOO Z11 Lite has good heat dissipation when playing games like BGMI and Call of Duty: Mobile. Its thermal management is among the best in the segment. After playing BGMI for 30 minutes, the Z11 Lite registered a 4-degree increase in temperature, which is comparatively lower than rivals (around 5 to 7 degrees). Similarly, with COD Mobile, the phone got hotter by 4.6 degrees Celsius, which is also on the lower side.
This makes the Z11 Lite a good option to consider if you’re someone who likes playing mobile games. The phone isn’t a gaming powerhouse, but it’s still capable of handling titles like BGMI and COD Mobile.
Reasons to skip the iQOO Z11 Lite
HD+ display
The iQOO Z11 Lite has a 6.74-inch HD+ (720×1600 pixels) LCD screen with a 120Hz refresh rate and 1,200 nits peak brightness. At this price point, the HD+ resolution seems quite lacking. On top of that, the Z11 Lite has a notch display, so the overall experience isn’t that great. For example, the Galaxy M17 offers an FHD+ display with an AMOLED panel at a more affordable price.
It’s worth mentioning that with the recent price hikes, phones that once cost under Rs 15,000 have now been pushed much higher. This has also led to HD+ becoming the standard display resolution in the budget segment. But it’s still something to consider, especially if you’re someone who expects a good quality display.
Waterdrop notch
As mentioned above, the iQOO Z11 Lite has a waterdrop notch, which is not only old but something we don’t see even in phones priced much lower. This gives the phone a slightly dated look, especially among its rivals in the same price segment.
So, should you buy the iQOO Z11 Lite? If your priorities include a reliable battery, good thermals for gaming, and AI features for productivity, then the Z11 Lite can be recommended. However, if you’re someone who requires good visuals and display quality, then you might want to check out alternatives. If you’re currently using a 2-3 year old budget phone with a smaller battery or no AI features, this could be a worthy upgrade.
